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Comparison Charts Comparison charts have been used as tools for organizing talk and thought, too. One teacher asked a group of children who had read many novels by Betsy Byars to discuss how they are similar. Midway through the conversation children had raised such points as "The parents are never around," "The main character is usually about our age," and "Some big problem is always there." The teacher then helped children generate a chart with the titles of Byars' books, such as The Night Swimmers,Cracker Jackson, and The Pinballs, placed top-to-bottom on the left side of a large sheet of paper. Across the top of the chart, the children generated categories, such as "Where the Parents Are," "About the Main Character," "Big Problems," and "Who Helps and How." Now that the conversation was well under way, the graphic organizer helped children focus and continue the discussion while they filled in the grid they had created on the chart. Later, other Byars books were added, such as The Summer of the Swans and The House of Wings, which children also read to see how they fit the pattern. Children created artwork that represented some of the categories and wrote about how the books were alike and different. These were matted and hung next to the comparison chart. This activity helped the children analyze particular stories, synthesize several stories, and evaluate later readings. From the chart, they were able to generalize about the books by one author, a sophisticated skill for 10- and 11-year-olds.
Byars, Betsy. The Burning Questions of Bingo Brown. Viking Penguin, 1988. Diaries and Letters Once children can assume another point of view, they are able to retell a story in the first person. Authors use letters, journals, and first-person narratives to allow a character to reveal thoughts directly to the reader. Older children are more able developmentally to take on another person's point of view. The books they read often assist in this because many popular stories are written as first-person narratives. Some authors, such as Barbara Park in Skinnybones and Walter Dean Myers in The Mouse Rap, tell their stories from the main character's point of view. Thus readers see through the eyes of another person as they are immersed in the book. Teachers help children take another point of view when they ask them to write about a book as if they were the main character telling a part of her or his story. Other authors reveal a character's thoughts by having the character write diary entries or letters. Libby in Zilpha Keatley Snyder's Libby on Wednesday is part of a young authors group and keeps a journal; Sam Gribley's journal reveals the story of My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George. In thirteenth-century England the title character of Karen Cushman's Catherine Called Birdy convinces her mother to let her write a journal rather than do her spinning. Henri, who spends a year in another culture in Emily Cheney Neville's The China Year, writes letters to her teachers and friends back in New York. Fourth-grader Anastasia in Lois Lowry's Anastasia Krupnik keeps modifying her "Things I love/Things I hate" list as her feelings and thoughts change. Children are quick to notice these narrative conventions if teachers help them. Judith Caseley's touching Dear Annie features some of the letters exchanged between Annie, her mother, and her grandfather from the time she is a baby to the time when she shared all 86 of them for her grade-school show-and-tell. After hearing Caseley's story, children might write their own letters to a treasured older relative or display the letters they have received. Because of their warmth, humor, or innovative formats, books like these are powerful catalysts to children's writing. Children may create diaries and letters for book characters who never kept them. In Katherine Paterson's Lyddie, the story of a New England mill girl, what might Lyddie have confided to her diary? In Mary Downing Hahn's ghost story Wait Till Helen Comes, suppose Molly kept a journal of the strange events leading up to her stepsister's dangerous friendship. How would entries show her gradual change from skepticism to alarm to action? Students might also create an imaginary correspondence between characters in one book; this requires children to maintain two points of view. In Carolyn Reeder's Shades of Gray, 12-year-old Will Page is forced to move to rural Virginia to live with his uncle, a conscientious objector in the Civil War. Children might write the letters Will never wrote to the friendly doctor who offered to adopt him. Or they might write Will's journal as he wrestles with the problems presented by the hard realities of rural life in Virginia following the war. Letters written and sent to authors and illustrators can be encouraged rather than assigned if a child or groups of children have read and are enthusiastic about books by that author. Authors appreciate the inclusion of self-addressed, stamped envelopes, or stamps, and they appreciate a child's candor and individuality above a "canned letter" copied from the chalkboard. Requests for pictures or biographical information should be addressed to publishers; letters to authors or illustrators should be addressed to them in care of the publisher.
Caseley, Judith. Dear Annie. Greenwillow, 1991. Read-Alouds to Build Comprehension Reading aloud to children can help to develop both vocabulary knowledge and comprehension skills. As noted in Chapter 1, reading aloud to children is the single most important activity for reading success. Well-written stories inspire exploration through talk. Realistic fiction can serve as an excellent springboard for classroom conversation. Teachers should model their own response to the story by "thinking aloud" about story events, addressing connections they make while reading, and the strategies they use to understand story events. Teachers should then encourage children to share their response to and understanding of the story. Reading aloud a set of realistic fiction novels that are related by a common theme or a common writing style encourages children to make connections between the novels and to deepen their responses. |