The UpDown Boy Level N
Text Type: Fiction • Word Count: 706

MORE LEVEL N
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WORKSHEETS FOR
THE UPDOWN BOY
Worksheets
U.K. Worksheets

LEVEL N
BENCHMARK BOOKS
Dinosaurs
Sally Takayama's Worst
Day Ever

COMPREHENSION QUIZ FOR
THE UPDOWN BOY
Comprehension Quiz
Level N Answer Sheet

Tommy Tales Books for Level N

Book Summary
The Updown Boy is the story of a boy who is sad because the people around him are sad. He wants to make everyone happy but can't figure out how. Eventually, he solves the problem by changing his view of the world. By walking on his hands, frowns become smiles. To his surprise, the updown boy helps to make the unhappy people around him happy once again. Whimsical illustrations support the text.

Lesson Objectives

Reading Strategies
Children should use a variety of strategies to decode words and bring meaning to print. The targeted strategy for this lesson is: Prediction
Children are likely to use various strategies to help them decode words in this book. Encourage them to look for words within words, to go back and reread to make sure the sentence makes sense, or to use the pictures in the book to help them with the more difficult words.

Once children are able to see the idea of the story they may be able to predict and/or visualize the outcome of some of the situations the updown boy finds himself in throughout the story.

Word and Print Skills
Phonics
S plural vs. 's
Have children look for words that end in s. This is a good story to discuss the difference between plural and apostrophe s used as a possessive.
Examples of these are ways, frowns, smiles, hands, legs, arms, and things.
The only example of the apostrophe s is used with the word boy's.

Word Work
Exclamation Marks
Synonyms

Comprehension
You will likely address a number of comprehension skills as children work to understand the text. The targeted comprehension strategy for this lesson is: Problem/solution and cause/effect.

• Using the beginning and ending of the story to show what the problem was and how the boy solved it through his experiences is a good way to show that sometimes things work out by themselves. Although the boy really tried to help everyone else to feel happy, it was during the time that he was exploring his new world and not trying to help anyone but himself that the people around him became happy again. Lesson: It is good to work hard to make things happen, but it is also good to let things work themselves out sometimes.

Visual Learning
Children will notice details in the illustrations to reinforce vocabulary and help them understand the text.

Targeted Vocabulary Words
Content words
These content words fall into the category of the senses and feelings.
Smile, frown, laugh, gooey, squiggly, tickly, rubbing, slickest, yuck, sad, happy, confusing, silly, excited, kick, bump, and slurped. After the story, you may want to brainstorm other words the author could have used to describe what the boy may have experienced and connect this back to the concept of synonyms