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Summary
"Certainly it takes
courage for a firefighter to rescue someone trapped in a burning
building, but there are many other kinds of courage too. Everyday
kinds that normal, ordinary people exhibit all the time, like "being
the first to make up after an argument," or "going to bed without a
nightlight."
Houghton Mifflin Books |
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Reading Strategies -
Strategies That Work by Stephanie Harvey
Predicting:
Before actually reading the book Courage to students, cover
up the words or just do a picture walk and have students predict what
is happening in each picture. Kids can actual infer from the
pictures to make a prediction as to what is happening by paying
attention to the details in the pictures. After you predict what is
happening on each page, you can read the story to verify their
predictions and begin a making connections lesson.
Making Connections:
Courage is a great book for students to make connections to their
life! Students can relate to some of the examples of courage in the
book and discuss or write about why that situation shows courage.
Activity:
Make a two column chart that states “Phrase from the Book” / “My
Connection”. This activity can be done in a whole group and
recorded as a class in primary grades, or in the upper grades students
can create their own individual two column charts.
Inferring:
Courage has wonderful opportunities to encourage students to
infer. The author does a great job with organization and word choice
to make the reader really think about why that phrase is an example of
courage. By looking at the pictures and reading each phrase students
can begin to describe in more detail why these are examples of
courage.
Activity:
Pull all or some of the phrases in the book on index cards or
strips of paper. Have students work in pairs or groups of three to
write down why that phrase is an example of courage. (Or you
could do this individually if you want to see if each student can
infer on their own.)
Have students share their written responses with the class and you
could record them on a two column chart that states “Phrase from the
Book” / “My Inference”. This chart becomes of great model of how
students can record inferences anytime they read.
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Writing Strategies - 6+1
Traits of Writing by Ruth Culham
This story
is great to use with the Organization trait because of
its interesting internal structure: a collection of sentences that
each define the word “courage.” In this text, Word Choice
is very closely related to Organization because both work together to
convey the many examples of “courage” we see in our daily lives.
Focus
Lesson for Courage (adapted from Using Picture Books to
Teach Writing With the Traits)
Materials: A copy of Courage, 2-inch strips of paper, markers,
writing paper and pens or pencils
Directions:
1.
Read aloud and discuss Courage. Ask students to tell their
favorite examples of courage from the text.
2.
List those examples on a chart – from serious to lighthearted. Note
how each example is unique, yet taken together, the examples give
students a broad definition of courage. Select another word such as
freedom, honor, justice, happiness, or joy.
3.
Ask students to brainstorm the different places where that word would
apply. For example, freedom might be used to describe a benefit of
living in a democratic society, or to describe the feeling we all have
on the last day of school.
4.
Pass out the sentence strips and markers and have students work in
pairs to write and, if time allows, illustrate a good example of how
the word might be used, such as “Freedom is what you feel when the
bell rings on the last day of school.” Or, “Freedom is one of the
most important principles of American society.” Or, “Freedom is what
you feel when you kick off a tight pair of shoes after a long day.”
5.
Post the sentence strips so all students can read them. Ask the
students to organize the strips to create a logical flow or pattern.
6.
Ask the class to revise any of the sentences that don’t work as well
as others, paying attention to how clear the example is, how easy it
is to read the sentence, and how well the words help the reader create
a picture in his or her mind. Add sequence and transition words
between sentences to show connections where desired.
7.
Create a picture book like Waber’s based on the word and the revised
sentence strips.
Additional Ideas:
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Ask
students to look up their word in an unabridged dictionary and
discover any new ideas for uses of the word that students may not have
thought of yet. Add more pages to their picture book if students
wish.
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Look for other picture books in the classroom library collection that
use both concrete and abstract examples to help the reader connect
with the main ideas. Contrast the organization in one of more of
these books to that or Courage.
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Create a dictionary that’s full of examples, not definitions! Have
students define a particular word by giving multiple examples of the
word, rather than its literal meaning.
For example: Courage n. Riding your bicycle
for the first time without
training wheels; being the first to make up after an argument; tasting
the vegetable before making a face.
Once each student has their word “defined,”
put the words in alphabetical order and bind them into a
“dictionary.” This would also be a fun way to test your students’
knowledge of content-area vocabulary!
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