Feelings - Lesson Plans

Feelings
Level C

About the Book

Text Type: Fiction/Realistic
Page Count: 12
Word Count: 67

Book Summary
Sometimes the boy feels kind of happy, and sometimes the boy feels very happy. Illustrations of the different events that trigger his emotions will help children understand the scale of the boy's feelings. This book demonstrates that feelings not only change, but they also change in intensity.

About the Lesson

Targeted Reading Strategy

Connect to prior knowledge

Objectives

Use the strategy of connecting to prior knowledge to make sense of text
Understand cause and effect
Segment onset and rime
Associate the letter Ff with the sound /f/
Recognize adjectives as words that describe
Identify words that mean the same (synonyms)

Materials

Book -- Feelings (copy for each student)
Chalkboard or dry erase board
Cause and effect, adjectives worksheets
Word journal (optional)

Indicates an opportunity for student to mark in the book. (All activities may be completed with paper and pencil if books are reusable.)

Vocabulary

High-frequency words: I, kind, very, of
Content words: feelings, happy, sad, angry, scared

Before Reading

Build Background

Ask students to name kinds of feelings. Write those on the board and say each word with students.
Have students think of times when they have felt happy, sad, angry, and scared. Ask what kinds of things make them have different feelings.

Book Walk

Introduce the Book

Show students the front and back covers of the book and read the title with them. Ask what they might read about in a book called Feelings. (Accept any answers students can justify.) Ask students to tell what the boy might be feeling based on the pictures. Ask students how they know the boy's feelings from his facial expressions.
Show students the title page. Discuss the information on the page (title of book, author's name, illustrator's name). Ask what the boys are doing and what they think the boys might be feeling in this picture.

Introduce the Reading Strategy: Connect to prior knowledge

Explain that good readers make connections between what they already know and new information they read. Remind students that thinking about what they already know about the topic of the book will help them understand what they read.
Model making connections to prior knowledge.
Think-aloud: When I look at the book cover, I notice the boy's facial expression. His eyes are wide and his mouth is open. I also see a spider. I know some people are scared of spiders. The boy's face reminds me of someone who is scared.
Ask students to preview the covers and title page of the book. Invite them to share how they connected to something they already know.
As students read, encourage them to use other reading strategies in addition to the targeted strategy presented in this section. For tips on additional reading strategies, click here.

Introduce the Vocabulary

Use the book walk as an opportunity to introduce unfamiliar vocabulary to students and model language patterns. For example, on page 4, say: I think the boy might be feeling kind of happy in this picture. What do you think? How do you think he is feeling in the next picture? Do you think he might say: Sometimes I feel very happy?
As vocabulary words are mentioned, have students point to the corresponding word to help them make the picture/word connection. For example, on page 4, point to the word happy and ask students how they might figure out the word. Have them think about what the picture tells them and what sound the word starts with. Read the sentence out loud and ask students if the word happy makes sense.
Encourage students to add the new vocabulary words to their word journals.
For additional tips on teaching high-frequency words or word-attack strategies, click here.

Set the Purpose

Have students look for feelings they have had or know something about as they read the book.

During Reading

Student Reading

Guide the reading: Give students their copy of the book. Have a volunteer point to the first word on page 3. Read the word together (I). Point to where to begin reading on each page. Remind students to read words from left to right. Point to each word as you read it aloud while students follow along in their own book.
Ask students to place a finger on the page number in the bottom corner of the page. Have them read to the end of page 6, using their finger to point to each word as they read. Encourage students who finish before others to reread the text.
Model connecting to prior knowledge.
Think-aloud: When I read page 6, I saw the expression of the children in the picture. Some of them looked happy and others looked sad. The children seemed to have uniforms on. There is a soccer ball in the picture. Maybe the children lost a soccer game. I have lost games before, so I know how disappointed I can feel when this happens.
Ask students what feelings they have read about. Encourage students to talk about times they have had similar feelings.
Remind students to think of the kinds of feelings they have had and why as they read the remainder of the story.

Have students make a small question mark in their book beside any word they do not understand or cannot pronounce. These can be addressed in the discussion that follows.

After Reading

Reflect on the Reading Strategy

Ask students what words, if any, they marked in their book. Use this as an opportunity to model how to read these words using decoding strategies and context clues.
Discuss how thinking about their personal experiences with different feelings helped them understand what they read. Invite students to share additional examples of how they connected to prior knowledge.
Think-aloud: When I looked at the picture on page 11, I thought about how the boy might be feeling. I don't think he would expect to find a spider that big behind his garbage can. I know I would be very shocked if I saw something like that. The boy has his hand over his mouth, as though he is startled. Using what I already know about feelings helped me understand what the boy was saying about his feelings. I was interested in reading the book because I already knew something about the topic.
Discuss additional strategies students used to gain meaning from the book.

Teach the Comprehension Skill: Cause and effect

Discussion: Ask students which event in the story is most like something they have experienced. Ask students to tell some good things they do when they get angry or sad.
Introduce and model the skill: Tell students to think about a time someone said, "If you drink your milk, you'll ..." Ask students to fill in the blank. Explain that one event can cause another event to happen.
Think-aloud: I know that something often happens because of something else. For example, I feel happy because I won a game. Winning the game caused me to feel happy, so it is the cause. Feeling happy is what happened, so it is the effect.
Check for understanding: Ask students to finish the following sentences: I feel ____ when I win a game. I feel _____ when I lose my lunch money.
Independent practice: Introduce, explain, and have students complete the cause and effect worksheet. If time allows, discuss their answers.

Build Skills

Phonological Awareness: Segment onset and rime

Say the word feel and tell students you can say the beginning part and the ending part of the word: f-eel. Tell students we call the beginning part the onset and the ending part the rime.
Say the word kind and model segmenting it into its onset and rime: k-ind.
Tell students you are going to say some words and you want them to say the onset and rime for each word. Say the following words one at a time: sad, chill, grim, best, bland, hose, white, keep, slap.

Phonics: Initial consonant Ff

Say the word feelings and ask students what sound they hear at the beginning of the word. Have them turn to the title page and put their finger on the word feelings and then on the letter that stands for the /f/ sound.
Have them find the word feelings on page 3. Ask what is different about the letter Ff in the word on the cover and on page 3 (capital letter; lowercase letter).
Write the words fat, fin, fed, fun on the board. Ask students what is the same about the words (begin with Ff). Have students sound out the word fat with you as you run your finger under each letter in the word. Then have a volunteer come up to the board and underline the letter that stands for the /f/ sound in the word. Repeat with the rest of the words.

Grammar and Mechanics: Adjectives

Have students turn to page 4 and have them put their finger on the word that describes the boy's feelings (happy). Explain that describing words, such as the word happy are called adjectives. Ask a student to stand. Have the group say some words that describe the student's blouse/shirt/sweater. Tell them the words they have suggested are adjectives.
Have students look outside. Ask what words they might use to describe the kind of day it is. Tell them the words they have suggested are also adjectives.
Independent practice: Introduce, explain, and have students complete the adjectives worksheet. If time allows, discuss their answers.

Have students circle all the words in the book that describe the boy's feelings.

Word Work: Synonyms

Direct students to page 5 of the book and have them put their finger on the word happy. Tell students that there are other words they can use that mean the same as happy. Ask them to identify other words they know that have a similar meaning as happy (glad, jolly, and so on). Explain that these words are called synonyms.
Have students choral read the sentence several times, substituting one of the words for the word happy.
Repeat with the other feeling words from the book: scared, angry, and sad.

Build Fluency

Independent Reading

Allow students to read their book independently or with a partner. Additionally, partners can take turns reading parts of the book.

Home Connection

Give students their book to take home to read with parents, caregivers, siblings, or friends.

Extend the Reading

Writing and Art Connection
Ask students to think of things that make them feel a certain way. Write the following sentence pattern on the board: ______ makes me feel _______. Ask each student to tell you what words they would like to put in the blanks. Ask students to draw pictures to go with their sentences. Collect the pages and display on a bulletin board titled Our Feelings.

Social Studies Connection
Discuss body language. Talk about how facial expressions and the position of a person's head, arms, and shoulders give clues about how a person is feeling. Invite volunteers to act out a feeling and have the rest of the group name the feeling.

Assessment

Monitor students to determine if they can:

use what they know about their own feelings to better understand the boy in the book and his feelings
correctly identify cause-and-effect relationships during discussion and on a worksheet
correctly segment sounds in words during discussion
accurately associate the letter Ff with the /f/ sound during discussion
locate adjectives in the book and on a worksheet; suggest adjectives to describe familiar objects
recognize words that mean the same as each other during discussion

Comprehension Checks

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