Big Pumpkin Lesson Plan

Students

• 9 boys; 11 girls
• Two TAG students; 1 student identified with ADD
• Very chatty bunch.  They are mostly visual and kinesthetic learners.  They love to see examples of what they are supposed to do before they do it. 

Instructional Objectives

Students will be able to:

• Retell the events that took place throughout the story using visual props in small groups.

Instruction

• First I will introduce the story Big Pumpkin by Erica Silverman. 
• After introducing the story, I will ask the students to look at the illustration on the cover of the book.  Based off of the picture and title of the book, I will ask the class to make predictions about what they think the story is about. 
• Next I will do a picture walk with the students.  I will tell them not to pay attention to the words on each page at the moment, only look at the pictures.  As a class, we will “walk” through the illustrations.  I will ask the students what they think is happening in each picture.
• Continue having the class make predictions.
• After the picture walk, I will read the story out loud to the class.
• When I have finished reading the story I will discuss how the characters need to work together to accomplish their goal of getting the pumpkin off the vine. 
• Next, I will show an example of the visual aids that they are about to make.  I will also demonstrate how they are going to use the visual aids to retell events of the story.  Students will then cut out and color paper puppets of the characters in the story and use them to act out/retell what happened in the story.  Students will work in groups of two. 

Content Standards

Language Arts Standard #6: students apply knowledge of language structure, language conventions, media techniques, figurative language, and genre to create, critique and discuss print and non-print tests. 

Instructional Materials

• Glue
• Scissors
• Crayons/Markers
• Popsicle Sticks for the paper puppets
• 10 copies of the paper puppets (students will work in groups of two and share)
• 1 Big Pumpkin Book

Assessment

Teacher will:

·         Observe student responses and behaviors while they act out/retell the events that took place throughout the story using visual props in their small groups. 

Adaptations/Accommodations

·         Directions will be repeated for students who are confused and or didn’t hear what they were supposed to be doing.

·         For the student identified with ADD, I will pair him with a student who is generally good at staying on task in the hopes that he will model the other student’s positive behavior. 

Reflection

This activity worked well.  The students really enjoyed the story and they had a blast using the paper puppets to retell the events of the story.  In the future I would make this a two day lesson as it took quite a bit of time to cut out and color the puppets.