A More Relaxed Book Report
I want my class to be able to talk about their books, and I want them to be able to tell their audience interesting things about the books. But, my students are non-native English speakers in Grades 1 & 2. I tried having them make book covers, or pictures to go along with their stories. Those did not capture their interest like I wanted. This week I tried having them write a friendly letter from one fairy tale character (our current unit of study) to another character in the same story. I used a Kidspiration template I found for friendly letters to give them a template. I had no idea how it would work, but it turned out better than I had thought. I liked the one letter from Jack (of Jack and the Beanstalk ) to the giant saying he was sorry that he stole the hen, but that he and his mother really needed the money. Today I had the kids go to the front of the room with a book they had read and I had the other students simply ask them questions about the book. That was...