Text Type: Fiction/Humorous
Page Count: 16
Word Count: 289

Book Summary
In Bonk, the Healthy Monster, Bonk becomes the new candy store's number one customer. He begins to have health problems after eating too much candy every day. How will Bonk become healthy again? This book provides the opportunity to introduce author's purpose to emergent readers. Pictures support the text.

About the Lesson

Targeted Reading Strategy

• Visualize

Objectives

• Use the reading strategy of visualizing to understand text
• Identify author's purpose
• Discriminate r-controlled /er/ sound
• Identify r-controlled er in words
• Identify adjectives as describing words
• Write words in alphabetical order

Materials

• Book -- Bonk, the Healthy Monster (copy for each student)
• Chalkboard or dry erase board
• Author's purpose, r-controlled er, adjectives worksheets
• Discussion cards

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

Vocabulary

• High-frequency words: asks, from, have, says, there's, too, with, you, your
• Content words: customer, dentist, exercise, healthy

Build Background

• Write the word healthy on the board and point to the word as you read it aloud to students. Repeat the process and have students say the word aloud.
• Ask students to tell what they know about ways to stay healthy. Discuss some strategies for staying healthy and make a list on the board.

Book Walk

Introduce the Book

• Show students the front and back covers of the book and read the title with them. Ask what they think they might read about in a book called Bonk, the Healthy Monster. (Accept all answers that students can justify.)
• Show students the title page. Discuss the information on the page (title of book, author's name, illustrator's name).

Introduce the Reading Strategy: Visualize

• Explain to students that good readers often visualize, or make pictures in their mind, as they read. Readers use what they already know about a topic and the words from the text to make pictures in their mind.
• Model how to visualize using the title.
  Think-aloud: When I read a book, I pause after a few pages or after reading a description of something to create a picture in my mind of the information I've read. This helps me understand the book. For example, when I read the title Bonk, the Healthy Monster, I pictured Bonk riding his bike and playing with his friends. I know that these are two ways to exercise and stay healthy. I wonder if this book might tell other ways Bonk stays healthy.
• Invite students to share what they visualized when they heard the title of the book. Have them compare the picture in their mind with the picture on the front cover.
• 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 Comprehension Skill: Author's purpose

• Explain to students that an author usually has a reason or purpose for writing a book. The purpose is to inform, entertain, or persuade. Explain that to inform means to give someone information about something; to entertain means to amuse someone; and to persuade means to convince someone to think the same way you do about something.
• Model identifying author's purpose.
  Think-aloud: When authors write, they have a reason, or purpose, for writing their book. They want to inform, entertain, or persuade readers. After reading the title and the first page of this book, I think the author wants readers to think about whether or not Bonk is doing things that are healthy. When I think about something, I usually learn new information. I think the reason the author wrote this book is to inform readers by telling them whether Bonk is making healthy or unhealthy choices. I have read some of the Monsters books before, and I know that they are usually entertaining. Sometimes authors write for more than one purpose. Maybe the author will help us learn new information and entertain us as well.

Introduce the Vocabulary

• While previewing the book, reinforce the vocabulary words students will encounter in the story. For example, while looking at the picture on page 3, you might say: A candy store has just opened, and Bonk has been waiting to buy and eat candy.
• Remind students to look at the picture and the letter(s) with which a word begins or ends to figure out a difficult word. For example, point to the word tummy on page 9 and say: I am going to check the picture and think about what would make sense to figure out this word. The picture shows Bonk bending over and looking sick. He has his hand on his stomach. When I look at the first part of the word, it starts like /t/. However, the word stomach starts with the /s/ sound, so this can't be the word. I know that another word for stomach is tummy. The word tummy starts with the /t/ sound. The sentence makes sense with this word. The word must be tummy.
• For additional tips on teaching high-frequency words and word-attack strategies, click here.

Set the Purpose

• Have students read to find out what happens to Bonk when he eats too much candy from the new candy store. Remind them to visualize as they read. Have students think about the author's purpose for writing the story.

Student Reading

• Guide the reading: Give students their copy of the book. Ask them to place a finger on the page number in the bottom corner of the page. Have them read to the end of page 5, using their finger to point to each word as they read. Encourage students who finish before others to reread the text.
• Model visualizing and identifying author's purpose.
  Think-aloud: As I read page 4, I visualized Bonk smiling as he grabbed the chocolate eggs, cotton candy, and taffy from the bag. I also pictured him stuffing the taffy into his mouth. I know that most people like to eat candy, but too much can be unhealthy. On page 5, I read that Bonk visited the candy store the very next day. This time he bought more candy and drank root beer as well. I was amused by the pictures of Bonk going crazy over all of the sweet things in the candy store. I think the author wrote this part of the story to entertain readers.
• Check for understanding: Have students read to the end of page 8. Invite volunteers to explain what they pictured in their mind when they read about Bonk's piggy bank getting lighter, unlike what was happening to Bonk. (Accept all answers that show students understand how to visualize.)
• Have students explain the author's purpose on page 8. Discuss why an author might want to entertain and inform readers at the same time.
• Have students read the remainder of the book. Remind them to continue visualizing and identifying the author's purpose as they read.

     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.

• Ask students what words, if any, they marked in their book. Use this opportunity to model how they can read these words using decoding strategies and context clues.

Reflect on the Reading Strategy

• Think-aloud: As I read, I continued to create pictures in my mind. When I read page 13, I pictured Bonk with a bag of candy, but this time he only ate a piece or two instead of the whole bag. Picturing these things in my mind helped me to understand and remember what happened in the book.
• Have students share how visualizing helped them better understand and enjoy what they read. Invite students to share additional examples of how they visualized scenes from the book.

Reflect on the Comprehension Skill

• Discussion: Discuss each page in the book through page 8 to identify the author's purpose for writing it. Write the words inform, entertain, or persuade on the board each time a page is discussed.
• Independent practice: Introduce, explain, and have students complete the author's purpose worksheet. If time allows, discuss their answers.
• Enduring understanding: In this book, Bonk becomes the number one customer at the new candy store by buying and eating too many sweets. At the end of the story, Bonk, with the help of his friends, learns that eating healthy foods and exercising makes him feel better. Now that you have read about Bonk's experience, why do you think it might be important to exercise and eat healthy foods?

Phonological Awareness: Discriminate r-controlled /er/ sound

• Say the word customer aloud to students, emphasizing the /er/ sound. Have students say the word aloud and then say the /er/ sound.
• Read page 7 aloud to students. Have them raise their hand when they hear a word that ends with the /er/ sound.
• Check for understanding: Say the following words one at a time and have students give the thumbs-up signal if the word ends with the /er/ sound: candy, number, owner, healthy, lighter.

Phonics: Identify r-controlled er

• Write the word customer on the board and say it aloud with students.
• Have students say the /er/ sound aloud. Then run your finger under the letters in the word as students say the whole word aloud. Ask students what letters stand for the /er/ sound in the word customer.
• Have students practice writing the er letter combination on a separate piece of paper as they say the sound the letters make.
• Check for understanding: Write the following words that end with the /er/ sound on the board, leaving off the final er: water, better, never, ever. Say each word, one at a time, and have volunteers come to the board and add the final er in each word.
• Independent practice: Introduce, explain, and have students complete the r-controlled er worksheet. If time allows, discuss their answers.

Grammar and Mechanics: Adjectives

• Write the following sentence on the board: Bonk is a healthy monster. Ask students to tell the word that describes the word monster (healthy). Explain that healthy describes the type of monster Bonk could be.
• Remind students that adjectives are words that describe people, places and things. Adjectives often come right before the word that names a person, place, or thing.

    Check for understanding: Have students reread page 12 and circle the adjectives. When they have finished, discuss with students the adjectives they located and the nouns they describe.

• Independent practice: Introduce, explain, and have students complete the adjectives worksheet. If time allows, discuss their responses.

Word Work: Alphabetical order

• Explain to students that words are sometimes placed in a list by alphabetical order. Words are placed in alphabetical order by first looking at the beginning letter of each word and then deciding which letter comes first in the alphabet.
• Write the words candy and food on the board. Underline the first letter in each word. Ask students which letter comes first in the alphabet, c or f. Explain that the word candy would come first in an alphabetical list.
• Write the words bag and big on the board. Point out that the words begin with the same letter (b). Ask a volunteer to tell which word would appear first in alphabetical order and why (bag because the second letter, a, in bag comes before the second letter, i, in big).
• Check for understanding: Write the following words on the board: bike, Bonk, balloon, bread, bubbles, blow. Have students write the words in alphabetical order on a separate piece of paper. When they have finished, discuss their answers.

Independent Reading

• Allow students to read their book independently. Additionally, partners can take turns reading parts of the book to each other.

Home Connection

• Give students their book to take home to read with parents, caregivers, siblings, or friends. Have them describe to someone at home how they visualized some of the events in the story.

Writing and Art Connection
Have students draw a picture of an event from the book that entertained them. Have them write why they found that part of the story entertaining.

Visit Writing A–Z for a lesson and leveled materials on humorous fiction writing.

Science Connection
Make a chart with a heading for healthy and unhealthy foods. Have students suggest foods from the book that go under each heading. Then list other healthy foods. Study a food pyramid and discuss which items belong in each food group.

Skill Review
Discussion cards covering comprehension skills and strategies not explicitly taught with the books are provided as an extension activity. The following is a list of some ways these cards can be used with students:

• Use as discussion starters for literature circles.
• Have students choose one or more cards and write a response, either as an essay or a journal entry.
• Distribute before reading the book and have students use one of the questions as a purpose for reading.
• Cut apart and use the cards as game cards with a board game.
• Conduct a class discussion as a review before the book quiz.

Comprehension Checks

• Book Quiz
• Retelling Rubric