My First Chapter Book Club
Book Series Baskets
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Junie B. Jones Henry and Mudge Cam Jansen Poppleton Mr. Putter and Tabby Fly Guy Frog and Toad Nate the Great Judy Moody Ready Freddy Amber Brown Magic Tree House Jigsaw Jones
©Lanesha Tabb
My First Chapter Book Club Day
Teaching Point
Day One
Connection: Readers, we've been working on making sure our partnerships are strong so that we have really amazing conversations and connections when we move into book clubs! Teaching Point: Today, you w ill be m eeting w ith your book club for the first tim e. [I chose to put my students in certain books clubs based on reading level and comprehension skills. Other book club cycles might allow them to pick their own club.] Workshop will look the same as far as my mini-lesson and your independent reading. What will change is instead of going to your partner to read and think together, you'll meet with your club. I'll show you TONS of ways to track your understanding while reading your chapter books over the next few days. Today, you will be simply going to your book club basket and browsing through your series. You will also talk about the things that you think might make your club run smoothly. You'll agree on some norms and you'll sign your club contracts. Active Engagement: Turn to your neighbor and discuss your hopes and thoughts about book club. What do you hope to get out of it? How are you planning to grow as a reader? Link: I'm so excited about these clubs. As I listened in I heard students setting goals for their reading and thinking work- and I heard something really cool: "I hope to have fun with books!" That was my favorite one because we must always remember to fall in love with our books. You'll go off to read alone with your just right books. When the timer goes off, you will find your new book club and follow the directions on your club contract sheet. You may also get your snack to enjoy at that time, but not before. Off you go! Connection: So, we are finally in book clubs! I know that you can’t wait to tear into your books and get your discussions going. Yesterday, we got to browse through your book baskets so that you could have a look at the titles. Teaching: Today, I want to talk to you about the order that we might read books in a series. I have a few baskets in front of me. One of them is the Hunger Games trilogy , The Magic Tree House, and Mr. Putter and Tabby books. Sometimes you’ll notice that a series has an order to it- and sometimes it doesn’t. Let’s look at the Hunger Games. It even says book 1, 2, and 3. I would certainly want to read book 1 before 2 or 3- or I would miss out on some important information! When I look at the Magic Tree house books, I notice that the author has them numbered here in the corner. My basket only has numbers 7, 12, 4, and 18. I don’t have them all, but that doesn’t mean I can’t think about which one I might want to read first. If I get confused, at least I know that the answers might be found in an earlier book. The last basket is filed with Mr. Putter and Tabby books. We’ve read a few this week, and I don’t think it really matters what order you read them in. So as readers, it is important to think about what order you want to read your books in! Active Engagement: I have the book club baskets here. I’d like you to gather into group of 3 or 4 and browse them. Do you notice an order to the books? Or does is not seem to matter? Talk with your friends!
Day Two
Copies/ Teaching Charts Baskets of books, folders, sticky notes
©Lanesha Tabb
My First Chapter Book Club
Day Three
Day Four
Day Five
Link: As you head out for your second day of club, keep in mind that this round of book clubs isn’t about speed reading. This is a good time to take is SLOW. We have a lot of thinking work to do! Off you go! Connection: Yesterday, we had our first real reading time in book clubs! We said that we would take our time and really dig in deep. Teaching Point: Today’s minilesson is more of a house keeping item. Now that we are in chapter books as a class, our book logs aren’t really working for us. When you read a chapter book, you might use one whole log for one book! Today I want to show you how to fill out our new log. (Show how to mark home or school and continuing page numbers with dashes). Active engagement: Most of you started a book yesterday. You didn’t have time to get in very far, did you? Today I’ll pass this out and we’ll record what we read yesterday together. Link: As you finish today and every day, you’ll need to record your reading in this log. You may take your book club folder home for homework if you choose. Connection: Yesterday we learned how to do new book logs! That is really going to help us track our reading. Teaching point. Today I want to chat about book selection. You have a basket of books to choose from. One thing you’ll want to think about is that partners can decide if they want to read the same title at the same time or if they want to each read a different title and then talk about the books and characters that might be in both books. You’ll need to think about what works best for YOU and your reading goals. Some of you might have books that are easier to read together because of the way the book is laid out. The words might be bigger and easier to share. Some might have chapter books that have teeny tiny words and involves a lot of visualizing- so it may not be so easy to share. If they choose different titles, you can always trade off with a person in your club! Active Engagement: Think about the books in your club. Do you think they might be easy to read together? Or would you prefer to read your own book and trade with a friend? *Prior to this lesson, I have been reading Horrible Harry aloud to the class. We’ve been tracking characters as a class. Today we add it to the work folder. Connection: Yesterday we decided if we were going to read our books together or alone. I was so impressed by all of you because you had such great conversations about why you should or shouldn’t read alone. Teaching: Today I want to teach you that readers keep track of characters as they are introduced. They try to figure out the relationship between them and the main character. They watch to see if that character is just passing through or do they have a real impact on the story. It’s just like when we’ve been reading Horrible Harry. In the first chapter alone, we met 8 or 9 characters! We took the time to write down their names, nicknames, and special quirks that they might have. Well, you can so the SAME thing in your own book! Active Engagement: Let’s look at our Horrible Harry “Meet the Cast” List and remember the kinds of things we were writing about the characters. We added things like nicknames, character traits, and BIG things that the character does.
Book Logs
Character Sketches Sheet
©Lanesha Tabb
My First Chapter Book Club
Day Six
Day Seven
Day Eight
Link: As you are reading in your book today- take a minute to track your characters that you are meeting. You might only have a few and you might have a lot! It is important to keep them straight in your own brain so that you can understand the story! Off you go! Connection: I remember one time I tried to read a book that I had no schema for. I kept getting distracted and the characters were all jumbled in my brain. The first thing I did was to sketch my characters like we did yesterday but that didn’t help me remember the story any better. Teaching point: Today I’ll share a few tricks to help your thoughts about the book stay organized. We’ve been tracking Horrible Harry as we read. We know that it is super important to stop at the end of each chapter to do some thinking. Today I’ll show you how to track a chapter-chunk. When you get to the end of a chapter, you will want to think of the three MOST important things that happened in the story and write them down. This will help you keep everything straight in your mind. Then, you can draw a quick sketch of your favorite part. Active engagement: Let’s look at the chapter chunk that we wrote this morning. We decided on three things that were most important and Ramon drew a sketch of our favorite part of the chapter. Link: As you read today, we’re going to go one chapter at a time. We need to jot down three things that are the most important. Are you ready? Off you go! Connection: I had such a great time peaking in your work folders last night. You guys are doing some wonderful thinking work as you dig in your chapter books. Teaching: I have noticed that a lot of you are coming across words or phrases that you don’t know. You’re not sure what to do with them! Well, I want to teach you that Readers can have a plan to figure out new words. And we keep track of them. When you are reading and you get to a word you don’t know the meaning of, the first thing you’ll want to do is think about how the word is being used in the story. Can you make a guess? If you can, write it down in your vocab words sheet. Include the page number so that you can ask your group for their ideas. Active engagement. Let’s take the chapter that we read this morning from Horrible Harry. Who remembers that part that we got to that talked about the “pansy” on Song Lee’s sweater? We weren’t sure about that word. You guys talked about it and you decided that it was a pattern on a shirt. Then, we were looking at the front cover and someone noticed that there were flowers on her shirt. We revised our guess and decided that it might mean a flower. That was excellent. work. So, ask your neighbor what they might do if they get to a word you don’t understand the meaning of. Link: Have your vocab sheet handy today. That way you will remember to add words and phrases that you aren’t sure about. Off you go! Connection: Readers, we are getting really deep into our books. Doesn’t feel good when you REALLY understand your story? Teaching Point: Today, I’d like to do some reflecting at the end of club. We will talk about our goals, what went well, and what we need to work on for next week. Active engagement: Let me show you the reflection sheet that you’ll use. I would like for each person to fill out their own sheet and turn it into me. Please be
Chapter Chunks sheet
Vocab words Sheet
Reflection 1/2 sheets
©Lanesha Tabb
My First Chapter Book Club
Day 9
Day Nine
honest so that we can make this time together the best it can be. Link: As you practice tracking characters, chunks, and vocabulary words, remember to chat about the things happening in your book. That is what a club is for! Don’t forget to fill out your book log and reflection before we go. Off you go! Connection: One time my family was driving out of town. We were going to see my friend. We’d never been there before but we looked online at the map to sort of get an idea where we were going. As we were driving, we were talking about all sorts of things. We weren’t really paying attention to the directions like we should have been. I started to look around and I just sort of knew something wasn’t right. The signs on the highway weren’t saying what I expected them to say. We had to finally admit that we were LOST. Sometimes the same thing can happen in our reading! You might be reading along and you sort of stop paying attention. Then you realize that you might be LOST in your book. Teaching: Today I want to talk about the idea that readers know when they’ve lost their way. It happens to all of us. I was reading last night and the television was on. I am pretty good at blocking out sounds when I read but last night I kept reading even though my brain was listening to the T.V. I got to the end of my chapter and I didn’t even know what happened! I didn’t want to read on, so I had to think of the best thing to do. I knew that I had to go back and reread. Let me show you what I mean. (Read a paragraph from our chapter book class read aloud and stop half way through to wonder what we are having for lunch. Model my thinking and go back and reread.) Active Engagement: Readers, tell your neighbor what you just saw me do while I was reading. Then I’ll jot down some warning signs that might help you know when you have lost your way. Link: When you are reading today and everyday, you’ll need to be careful that you notice when you lose your way. You’ll want to make sure that you stop and reread so that you understand. Connection: My best friend in college was a runner. Every morning she got up early to go for a run. I noticed that she always got dressed, put on her tennis shoes and instead of leaving right after that, she always took a few minutes to stretch and warm up. She told me that she needed her body to wakeup so she would have a better run. Teaching: Readers, we are digging deep into our chapter books which means that we are sticking with one book for a longer amount of time. Sometimes when we sit down to read, we need to do the same thing my college roommate did- warm up before we start. One way to do this is to take a minute to skim the book. You might even read your chapter chunks so you don’t forget any important parts. Active Engagement: Let me show you what I mean. When we read Horrible Harry this morning, think about all of the things we did before we read a chapter. Turn and talk to your neighbor about it. Wow1 I heard lots of things about warming up. I heard people say that we read our chapter chunks and that helped us remember that Mary told Harry that she NEVER breaks the rules and Harry replied with
BME character track
©Lanesha Tabb
My First Chapter Book Club
Day Ten
“Never? We’ll see about that!” Now we know to look out for Harry to catch Mary breaking the rules. I also heard some of you saying that we look at our character sketches as well as the words we don’t know sheet. Link: As you go off to read today, and when you take your book home, think about what you might do to warm up for your chapter book. You’ll find that your brain is much more ready to take in new information from the plot! Off you go! Connection: You guys know that my daughter is almost 2. She has changed so much since she was born. She used to crawl, drink bottles, and sleep all the time. Now she walks everywhere and eats the same food we do. She has changed so much over time because she has learned new things that change the way she acts and what she does. Teaching: Your characters might do the exact same thing. Good readers notice when characters change across books in a series because they’ve gotten to know the characters really well. We read Jigsaw Jones awhile back. One of our favorite characters was Bigs Malone. We liked how he made the book more interesting, did we? We also took some time to really think about Bigs. He totally changed as the book went on! He started off really mean and everyone was cared of him- the big BULLY. Then, Mila and Jigsaw went to his house and saw a different side of him. They realized that he didn’t have very many friends. That changed the way they thought about Bigs and Bigs started to be friendlier to them. We knew those characters really well because we stopped to think about them and notice what they were doing. Active Engagement: Think about the books that you are reading. Some characters change- and some don’t. If you have a character that is changing, chat with your club about some of the things that you notice happening. If your characters don’t change, think about a book that we’ve read as a class and chat about how they changed across a book. Link: As you’re reading today and this evening- you can track your character’s changes. I even have a paper that you can use to track if you think that would help you. Feel free to grab it if you need it!
Day 11 Readers focus on dialogue. It gets tricky. Follow closely. Day 12
Connection: One time I got an email from a friend. We had plans to meet up over the weekend but there was supposed to be a big snowstorm. I emailed her to say that I didn’t think I’d make it because of the snow. She understood but in her email, she mentioned that she didn’t think the snow would be that bad and she told me that she cancelled all of her other plans. I had some inferring to do. Using the evidence that she gave me in her email, I was able to realize that she was really disappointed. She didn’t come right out and say that she was disappointed but I could tell because she made sure to tell me that she cancelled her other plans. Readers can do the same thing. Sometimes you will have to infer how a character feels by thinking about how they feel based on the words they say. Teaching Point: Today I want to teach you that readers can infer how a character feels by using text evidence to support those inferences. Let me show you what I mean. Remember when we read Horrible Harry this morning and
©Lanesha Tabb
My First Chapter Book Club
Day 13
Mary blew up her bangs? Mary didn’t say a single word but we could infer how she was feeling by using those words as evidence that she was annoyed with Harry and Doug. We were careful to notice that small piece of text and take it in. Helps us make the picture of who Mary is. We added it to her character sketch and found that that was totally something Mary would do. Active Engagement: Lets practice this together. Listen as I read a paragraph to you. You have to read between the lines. “Mom! What are we having for dinner?” I asked. “Spaghetti and meatballs.” Mom replied. “Again?” I said. Mom rolled her eyes and shook her head. I quickly left the room. What might we infer about how mom was feeling? Turn and talk with your neighbor. Wow. I listened in and heard so many great inferences. I heard most of you chatting about how mom felt tired, frustrated, and a little annoyed. Link: As you read by yourself, in club, and at home- always be on the lookout for the chance to read between the lines. When the author tells you that a character is doing something with their body, chances are you’ll need to infer how they are feeling. And always remember to sticky note it or jot it down so that you can show your evidence. Noticing patterns within a series. Is there a rhythm to your book?
Day 14
We notice the big ideas of a series. What does the author tend to write about?
Day 1517
Readers are moved to take action- let’s do it.
Big ideas tracking sheet.
©Lanesha Tabb
