Teaching Theme

Theme is a large focus of our 4th grade Reading curriculum, and a skill students often struggle with.  We have spent two weeks working on theme and I am impressed with how well my students are grasping this skill, one week using poetry and this past week using literature.

I started with Nicole Shelby's Reading Interactive Notebook to teach the concept of theme, if you have not purchased this product I HIGHLY recommend it!  I usually start all my reading lessons with Nicole's notebook, this is what we do the first day and refer back to the information as we work on the skill.

I also used two sets of theme task cards this week in whole group, guided practice, and small group.  {I used Rachel Lynette's Find the Theme Task Cards & Deb Hanson's Theme Task Cards} On the second day I glued a task card to the center of a very large post-it note that was given to me from my BBB Joanne from Head Over Heels for Teaching.  Each student wrote down what they believed the theme was and provided evidence from the text to support their thinking.  Teams then shared with the class their task card, theme, and evidence.

On the third day I provided students a copy of "The Summer Table" from Wonder by R.J. Palacio.  {We are reading this aloud and my kiddos LOVE it}.  Students silently read the passage circling any unfamiliar words.  We then discussed the words and they read the chapter again with their partner.  Pairs then determined the theme of the chapter and supported their thinking by finding evidence from the text.

The fourth day we read "Weird Kids" from Wonder and followed the same steps as the day before.  Using these two chapters we then compared themes.  Again, my kids did great!

On the final day, I had a sub, and left her passages to use with my students to review the skill.  Learnzillion.com has some wonderful videos/power points for teaching theme as well.

What are some strategies, resources, books, etc. you use to teach theme?  Here are a few of my favorites!

I use Nick's Themes in Literature for independent practice.

Learnzillion.com

Wonder by R.J. Palacio

Great Mentor Text for Theme

Check out this post to see a resource I used for teaching theme of a poem....Freebie included!