Did you know, engaging in activities before reading a book is an evidence-based strategy that supports students in incorporating new knowledge into an existing schema (Ukrainetz, 2006)?
Simply put, pre-reading activities help students connect new information with what they already know, making it more meaningful and easier to understand.
They also allow us to account for cultural, linguistic and socio-economic differences and lay a strong foundation for narrative skill development (Prath, 2017).
The purpose of pre-reading activities is to engage students in lively discussions about topics and words that will help students comprehend the story.
And, if we want students to be engaged during discussions, we need to provide interesting stimuli.
Below you’ll find engaging pre-reading activity ideas that not only serve to activate background knowledge and pre-teach key concepts relating to winter themed books, but that also present opportunities to work on other goals like:
Vocabulary
Pronouns
-ing verbs
Formulating sentences with grammar/syntax targets
Artic carryover
Asking questions
Answering questions
Describing
and more!
Virtual Field Trips
Take a virtual field trip to a zoo! This is a great way for students to see polar animals up close and spur discussions that activate background knowledge relevant to your polar animal themed story.
Encourage student driven discussion and follow their lead. Try not to put a timestamp on duration of the discussion - it's okay for pre-reading activities to take one to two sessions!
If you need prompts to get the conversation going, here are some ideas:
Talk about related terms like tundra and blubber
Where does the animal live in the wild? What kind of habitat does the animal live in out in the wild?
How does the animal survive in freezing conditions?
What does the animal eat?
Think about prompts that connect to the animal in the book you're going to read
You can also use this time to work on skills like vocabulary, formulating sentences with grammar/syntax targets, artic carryover, asking questions, answering questions, and describing.
Here are a couple of live cams from the San Diego Zoo:
Favorite books featuring polar animals: Polar Bear Island, The Not-So-Perfect Penguin, If I Had a Polar Bear (see more books my YouTube playlist)
Pre-teach Vocabulary
Understanding vocabulary is essential for text comprehension.
Make a list of key terms that are essential to comprehending the story, along with tier II and III vocabulary words that appear in the text.
You can write them on a sticky note and keep it on the inside cover of the book for future use.
Once you have your list of vocabulary words, you can engage in activities that explicitly target their meaning, synonyms, and antonyms, and practice using the terms in a sentence.
Try one or more of the activities below:
Make a word cloud
Vocabulary journal
Create vocab posters to refer back to when reading the story
Sort words by part of speech & display on word wall
Semantic maps
As you read the story, if students don't recall the meaning of the term, thy can refer back to their vocabulary activities.
If students do recall the meaning of the term, have them replace the term in the text with a synonym!
Favorite books set in winter: Froggy Gets Dressed, The Snowy Day, The Snow Thief
Making Predictions
Have fun making predictions while looking at the book cover and/or flipping through the pages to glance at the illustrations.
You can use prompts like:
What do you think the story will be about?
What kind of story do you think this is? (e.g. funny, adventurous, scary, sad) Why do you think that?
Where do you think the character will go in this story?
Where do you think the story takes place? What clues do you see?
What do you think the problem or challenge in the story could be?
(while looking at an illustration of the problem/initiating event) How do you think the character will try to solve the problem?
If you plan to use this book in the future or for multiple groups, you could jot prompts down on sticky notes and place them on the inside cover/on the corresponding pictures so you have them prepped and ready to go!
Another idea is to write student predictions down on a white board and check in with them as you read the story to see if they were accurate. You could also revisit the predictions as you dive into the story to see if students want to modify their predictions and explain why.
All About Hibernation
YouTube videos are a great tool to discuss and learn about topics that relate to winter like hibernation!
Here are two of my favorite hibernation videos:
Have fun activating knowledge and learning new vocabulary that will lay a foundation for understanding your story that features hibernation.
The videos also provide an opportunity to work on:
Describing (e.g. bear, hedgehog, squirrel)
Adjectives
Formulating sentences with grammar/syntax targets
Summarizing, retell
Asking questions
Responding to wh questions
Articulation carryover skills
Favorite books featuring hibernation: Bear Can't Sleep, Bear Snores On, A Loud Winter's Nap, Apple Trouble, Harold Hates to Hibernate
Building a Snowman
Are you reading a book about a snowman or building a snowman? Then you might be interested in this YouTube video all about engineering and how to build a snowman.
After having a background knowledge activation discussion, try working on skills like...
Sequencing the steps needed to build a snowman
The concept of balance
Words related to size like big, bigger, biggest
Positional words - top, middle, bottom
Temporal words - first, next, then, last
Favorite books featuring snowmen: How to Catch a Snowman, The Biggest Snowman Ever, Snowmen at Night, Froggy Builds a Snowman, Sneezy the Snowman
All About Winter Sports
Talk about winter sports! Search Google for pictures or YouTube for videos to support your discussion.
Make a list with students - see how many winter sports they can think of!
Discuss where the sports take place (e.g. mountainside, ice rink, frozen pond), the equipment needed (e.g. ice skates, knee pads, helmet, sunglasses), how each sport works, etc.
You can even compare and contrast sports and have students vote on which sports seem the easiest and hardest.
KWL Chart
You can pair a KWL chart (know, want to know/wonder, learned) with any book.
Fill one out as a group and fill in the "learned" column together after reading your story.
I hope this has been helpful! 😊❄️
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