Design A Game Book Report

I want to share a book report that I've done with my students for a number of years. It's been  a HUGE hit with not only my students, but their parents, as well.

We all know that kids love to play games, so I decided to design a game book report. My objective was to convince my students that they should read books that are different genre. 

Ask your students what genre they like the best. I bet many will say realistic fiction is their favorite. There are some who gobble up mysteries, some will swear that fantasies are their favorites.

I also wanted to get parents involved in some way. That's when I decided to add a "bonus points" feature because the majority of my students love to earn bonus points.

I decided to title it, "Design A Game" book report.  Really original title eh? :)

The parent involvement is easy! All they have to do is play the game with their kids at home and sign the letter stating they played the game with their kids. A whopping five points can be earned for a total of 105 points if everything else is done correctly. 

The way you introduce it to your students is fun. Pass out the "Congratulations" slips to them and watch them sit up and take notice. It's an announcement that they've been chosen, by a game company, to design a game based on a book.  Just this little slip of paper and its message, makes them feel important.

The kids have to design a game board that has questions or statements about the book they're reading. Then we have a game day where they all play each others' games and learn about new books. It's amazing how many comments you'll hear as they play the games like, "I really really want to read this book!"  "I never thought I'd like historical fiction, but this one sounds really good."  

The kids talk about the project with their friends and tell them about a new book they want to read. The word spreads and pretty soon, you'll see your students reading new books of different genre. 

WHAT'S REALLY FUN IS TO HAVE A game "night" so parents, friends and family can join in the fun and play the games. 

At the end of the year, there are always students who are kind enough to leave their games with me so I can share them with my future students! :)

Everything you need is in the packet. Parent letter, student rubric, how-to game instructions and more.  Be sure to read teachers' comments below the product description and you'll see how popular my Design a Game Book Report is! 

Have fun!

Ruth

NonFiction Find It, Check It

When I first started teaching nonfiction, I wanted to model a lesson for my students that would be fun. That week, we brainstormed for topics they like reading about. I asked them to give me topics and not specific genre. Before I knew it, my board was covered with topics I never knew interested them. Some listed hobbies, others listed sports, and games they enjoy, but the topic that won, when we voted, was animals.

I think back to when I was in school and my all time favorite topic was horses. I lived, breathed and dreamed about black stallions, prancing pintos and buttermilk colored mares with dark manes. I was sure that if I asked the girls what specific animals they loved, it would be horses.

This was the perfect time to write TOPIC on  the board and under it, the word SUBTOPIC. I then asked for a volunteer to give me the name of a specific animal.

One of my eager girls was oooo'ing and almost fell off her chair as she waved her hand wildly. 

"Call on me, call on me!" she moaned.  I was sure she was going to say "HORSE" so when she yelled "CAPYBARA" I was stunned. Capybara are in the rodent family and are, from what I've read, the largest rodents in the world. They live in South America and are quite vocal! From her response, I realized that times sure have changed. I wondered what the rest of the kids would say....

Here's a little video of a capybara being petted at the Explorarama Lodge on the Napo River in the Amazon. Listen to the chitter chatter of this cute critter!
I showed this video to the kids and they were all crying out "I WANT ONE! I WANT ONE! I told them I wasn't sure if their parents would really like it if they brought one home and told them my two dachshunds would definitely NOT like it at all.

Capybara - YouTube

Back to Nonfiction....

I told my capybara girl that I didn't think we could think of a lot of details about the capybara, so we had to select another animal on the board. I praised her for knowing about capybara and she beamed.

The kids added many subtopic animals to our list on the board. Some were giraffes, dolphins, lions, tigers, hamsters, guinea pigs, hippos and more. I found it strange that most were wild animals instead of domesticated pets like kittens, puppies, canaries and HORSES!

At that point, I had them vote for one so I could continue my lesson, which by this time, had the kids really interested and on task. They selected dolphins. I kidded with them and told them dolphins would be too big for their home aquariums. Immediately, I had one boy blurt out that he'd build a HUGE aquarium for it. I grinned and told him I'd like to be in on that project.

We then listed details about dolphins... mammals, live in water, eat other fish, intelligent, etc. Right after that I handed them one of my worksheets that I created and broke them into small groups. They were to do some research about other animals and had to have all the same answers on their worksheets which means they'd have to agree about what was important and what wasn't.

I recently put this Nonfiction Find It, Check It packet together to share with everyone. You'll find worksheets that can be used with any Nonfiction text, a poster, bookmarks with NonFiction features and more.

I also included a detailed animal lesson with excellent kid friendly websites. The Smithsonian National Zoo has animal cams the kids can watch. There's a NASA site with facts about the sun. The National Geographic animal site is another excellent website I included.

This is a great packet that teaches kids the features of nonfiction and motivates them to find the features in any nonfiction text.

I'm still wondering why kids don't like black stallions or pinto ponies.  Times sure have changed...

Have fun!

Ruth

260 Journal Prompts

I'm so excited to let everyone know that this packet of free journal prompts has been modified. I've added MANY more prompts! 
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Ever pass out a writing prompt and hear a student say "I don't like that topic!" or "I don't like to write!" or "I'm not going to write!"??? I remember feeling the same way in school because I sometimes couldn't relate to the topic; it just didn't interest me. 

You talk with those students, plead, beg and practically stand on your head to get them to write at least one or two sentences. Sound familiar? 

When I was in school, the "back to school" prompt was always..... ready? I'm sure you know what it is.. 

WrIte an essay on what you did over the summer vacation. 

Should I really write about the time I told my mother I was bored one hot summer day. She told me to go fry and egg. And I did! On the driveway! The white of the lovely fried egg left a permanent mark on our driveway. Needless to say, my father wasn't particularly happy about it. It was a new driveway! Uh oh

At the time, I doubted it would go over big with my teacher, so I wrote about going to Girl Scout camp. Whoop dee doo. She probably had to read 20 essays about Girl Scout camp. 

Over the years I've collected many prompts and I asked the kids what types of prompts they'd like. 


 These prompt really get the pencils moving! They're also good for lively discussion topics! 

Best part is, they're free :)