Reader's Workshop and Animal Fantasy Dioramas

Our superstar students were very busy this week during Reader's Workshop. The beginning of the week was dedicated to one of our favorite books, Jan Brett's The Mitten. After reading this story, we created our own mitten craft to use while practicing the skill of retelling. In the spirit of full disclosure, I did have to glance once (or twice!) back in the book to remember the correct order of the animals as they climbed into the mitten. {Mole, Rabbit, Hedgehog, Owl, Badger, Fox, Bear, Mouse....SNEEZE!} *Ask your child if they can retell you the entire story at home! : )

Later in the week, we transitioned to learning all about reading dialogue. We worked on how to identify when someone in the story is talking, how good readers read dialogue and how it helps us to better understand what is happening. The students did a great job demonstrating their new skills by marking up a copy of the classic Frog and Toad story, Spring. Not only did they apply everything they learned from the mini-lessons, but they also read with tremendous expression, which helped us to really differentiate which character was talking and when.

Awesome job by our rock-star readers! We will conclude our Animal Fantasy genre study at the end of next week and will be diving right into our next unit of Fables and Folktales. : )

Before you go...please be sure to check out the pictures of our Animal Fantasy dioramas. The students did a fabulous job bringing their creative ideas to life. Each student chose their own animal, the animal fantasy setting they wanted to create (a human dwelling, an animal habitat, or an animal habitat with human furnishings) and the text bubble of what their character was saying. I was completely blown away by the level of creativity and imagination demonstrated by my students- the end results are incredible! : )