I was incredibly excited to post this product in my store. It’s something that I’ve been working on for a long time. Not only is it the first novel unit that I’ve done for TPT, but it’s also one of my favorite texts to work on with students of all time. Not only have I put together some great things for students in this product, but I also think this is a great resource for teachers who want to learn more about teaching guided reading or literature circles in a small group setting. I know the quote is overused, but I love it: “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” This is not a product that will provide students with a bunch of busy work surrounding the novel and give teachers “a break”. It is a product that will show teachers not only how to teach Tuck Everlasting, but ideas for how to teach in small reading groups for ANY novel.
The product description is below:
This versatile unit can be used in the middle school language arts classroom in a guided reading, literature study, or whole-class type of setting. Tuck Everlasting is broken down into seven sections. Each section includes:
-Text Introduction: A teacher guide for what to say when introducing the next section of the text including challenging vocabulary, text connections, preloading difficult concepts, etc. There is also bookmarks for students to use to provide textual support to support their thinking for each section.
-Comprehension Questions: The comprehension questions are broken down into within, beyond, and about the text question. They are included within the teacher plans and also formatted into a printable worksheet.
-Skill Work Reinforcement: For each section, something is pulled out of the text to emphasize something with grammar, punctuation, or writer’s craft. Examples from the text are used to emphasize these teaching points.
-Extension: Creative writing ideas to extend the meaning of the text are prepared for each section of the text and formatted onto lined, printable paper to distribute to students.
-Fluency Check: Each section includes a fluency check with a section of the text to have students read out loud. This is a great tool for progress monitoring and setting goals for working with students who may struggle with oral reading and/or comprehension of the text.
In addition, this product comes with a menu of options for final projects to complement the book, a rubric to evaluate individual student participation in the group, and alignment to the Common Core State Standards.
This is a great product for a teacher who is serious about working closely with students to improve their students as overall readers. It is not a unit that is intended to pacify students with “busy work” surrounding the text. It is an intensive unit of study that requires the student and the teacher to have rich conversation and critical thinking surrounding the text. Download the preview to see what one section of the product includes to see if this is something that would work for you in your classroom.
