Unlock Deeper Learning with Picture Books
Reading, Writing, Science & Beyond
Teaching with picture books in 3rd grade is magic. Picture books engage kids, and no matter the age of students, visuals grab and keep attention, spark curiosity, and simplify challenging ideas and vocabulary.
By the time kids can read on their own, library specialists and parents mostly stop buying picture books and give the priority to chapter reading, which makes sense. However, picture books are not only for primary grades.
A large amount of picture books are written for upper elementary students, especially picture books that teach both, reading and science, or reading and social studies. For so many reasons, I use picture books to teach all language arts standards, science, and social studies.
How This Book Got RED is the new super engaging picture book. The Giant panda and red panda get all excited to read a book about pandas only to realize that there is not a mention of red pandas in the story.
The little red panda is perfectly drawn with all its cuteness and big emotions. The absence of red pandas is very upsetting to him, which leads Red Panda to start writing a book of its own. The illustrations are superb and bring this story and its message to life on every page.
To add to this great picture book, How This Book Got Red Lesson Plan includes reading about red and giant pandas, their differences and similarities, habitat, diet, physical characteristics, etc.
Throughout the lesson students not only learn a lot about animal characteristics, new vocabulary, and pandas, but they also practice reading comprehension skills of cause and effect, inferencing, compare and contrast, author's purpose, theme(s), main idea, writing skills, grammar, and SO MUCH MORE!
To find out why there were no red pandas in the text, you will have to get the resource. :)
Have Fun Teaching!
Mrs. Lena, M.Ed.
