The Mitten Tree

Schools and Teachers

Reinhard Elementary Teacher: Susan Bella

Description

After reading and discussing the different parts of the story The Mitten Tree, the first grade ENL students concluded that the theme of the story was "Kindness." The children learned and discussed that kindness can be shown in many ways. As a writing activity the students wrote personal responses to the story and created buncees as a follow up project. As always, the children enjoyed the creative buncee tools. We were hoping to add voice recordings to the buncees but did not get to it as school ended early this year. The children also listened to the story The Mitten Tree in Mrs. Schriver's first grade classroom. As another writing activity the class wrote about what they prefer to wear, mittens or gloves. Their stories were then displayed outside their classroom. Facilitated by the Student Council, children from the Reinhard Elementary school donated gloves and mittens for other children in nearby communities. As the mittens and gloves were collected, they were displayed outside Mrs. Schriver's classroom on painted trees with the title "Cold Hands -Warm Hearts."

Content

I can identify the theme and recall important details from a story.

Procedure

This was a culmination of a few lessons. Before Reading In ENL class the children previewed the story "The Mitten Tree" by looking at pictures and predicting events in the story. Specific vocabulary was also introduced and discussed with students before the book was read - spruce tree, shutters, cap, needles, wool, knit, porch. I pointed to pictures and labeled them as we looked through the book (picture walk).

Read Aloud During the read aloud, the children continued to predict as we discussed the characters, setting, and events for the beginning, middle, and end of the story.

Mini-lesson - Character Traits (internal) - How a character/person behaves. As a group we discussed and listed character traits for Sarah. We then shifted the conversation to how we are kind to others and how others are kind to us. The children then worked independently writing about their own personal experience with kindness. When the students finished writing they illustrated their story. I conferenced with each student and we discussed the importance of capitalization, punctuation, and spelling. Depending on the level of each student there were different expectations.

With teacher assistance the students created buncees. Each student typed their story and included stickers and animated stickers in their buncee. They chose their color background and moved the objects around the page to find the right spot.

Resources and Other Materials

• Buncee