Comparison Charts
Comparison charts have been used as tools for organizing talk and thought. 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's 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.
———. Cracker Jackson. Viking, 1985.
———. Goodbye, Chicken Little. Harper & Row, 1979.
———. The House of Wings. Viking, 1972.
———. The Night Swimmers. Delacorte, 1980.
———. The Pinballs. Harper & Row, 1977.
———. The Summer of the Swans. Viking, 1970.

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. 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. Marissa Moss records Amelia's thoughts and sketches in her series of school notebooks, including popular titles such as Amelia's Most Unforgettable Embarrassing Moments. 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 grandfather from the time she is a baby to the time when she shared all eighty-six 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 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? Student might also create an imaginary correspondence between characters in one book; this requires children to maintain two points of view.
            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.
George, Jean Craighead. My Side of the Mountain. Dutton, 1988 1959].
Hahn, Mary Downing. Wait Till Helen Comes. Houghton Mifflin, 1986.
Lowry, Lois. Anastasia Krupnik. Houghton Mifflin, 1979.
Myers, Walter Dean. The Mouse Rap. HarperCollins, 1990.
Neville, Emily Cheney. The China Year. HarperCollins, 1990.
Moss, Marissa. Amelia's Most Unforgettable Embarrassing Moments. Simon & Schuster, 2005.
Park, Barbara. Skinnybones. Knopf, 1982.
Snyder, Zilpha Keatley. Libby on Wednesday. Delacorte, 1990.

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.

Studying Authors' Craft: Analyzing Character Development
Contemporary realistic fiction can provide a forum to discuss the techniques authors use for character development. Because these stories are so often about children their own age, students readily identify with the characters and can often comment on whether the actions of the characters "ring true." When students study how authors have crafted their writing to introduce and develop the characters in their novels, students can learn useful techniques to incorporate into their own writing.
            Select a work of contemporary realistic fiction, such as the Newbery Award-winning Criss Cross by Lynne Rae Perkins (Green Willow, 2005). Begin reading aloud to the students and pause to think aloud at the moments when the author reveals information about the character. Criss Cross is written in the third person (remember that point of view is a vehicle for character development), and on page one, the text reads, "She wished something would happen…." This is the first place that you should pause and think aloud, "This tells me that this character is not so happy with the way things are. She's bored and she wants something interesting to happen." Continue with this process, recording the text samples and your thoughts on chart paper. After you have gathered several examples, go back and revisit each one to discuss what technique the author has used to reveal the information that you have learned about the character. In the first example, you might note that the author has used a simple and direct statement which reveals how the character feels about her life at the moment. Continue until you feel that your students are reading to try this process of discovering an author's techniques for character development in contemporary realistic fiction titles they are reading independently. A recording sheet is provided for them to document their findings: Chapter 9 Recording Sheet (20.0K) . To conclude this activity, you will want to compile a class list of "ways that authors tell us about their characters." Students can refer to this list and try out these techniques in their own writing.