Building Literacy in a Collaborative Classroom: Toys and Play

In this module, students build their literacy and citizenship skills as they engage in a study of toys and play. In Unit 1, students consider norms and behaviors for sharing toys and interacting with peers through structured conversations, learning experiences such as role-play and guided discovery of toys, and an analysis of the text Llama Llama Time to Share by Anna Dewdney.

In Unit 2, students learn more about toys as they consider what makes something a toy and what makes toys fun. They learn to sort and describe toys by specific attributes. They also begin to think about perspective as they discuss and write about their own toy preferences, using language and ideas from the text Toys Galore by Peter Stein.

In Unit 3, students deepen their understanding of perspective as they read the text Have Fun, Molly Lou Melon by Patty Lovell. Students also learn about toys from a historical perspective using the text Playing with Friends: Comparing Past and Present by Rebecca Rissman. As a culmination of the unit, students interview a classmate about his or her preferred classroom toy. They use the information from the interview to create their performance task: an informational piece of writing and drawing about their classmate’s preferred toy and how the classmate likes to play with it

Big Ideas & Guiding Questions

• What can we do to make playing together fun?
• People can learn to play and work together through cooperation.
• What makes toys fun?
• Using your imagination makes toys fun.
• Which classroom toy do I prefer? Why do I prefer that classroom toy?
• Everyone has preferences and reasons for their preferences.
• What toys do others prefer? Why do they prefer them?
• Different people prefer different toys for different reasons.