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Teachers College Reading and Writing Project
Reading Curricular Calendar, Sixth Grade, 2016-2017
Fantasy Book Clubs
Fantasy Book Clubs
April - May
Welcome to the Unit
In this final fiction reading unit for sixth grade, you’ll find an emphasis on developing students’
knowledge of literary traditions, and encouraging students to read with more maturity and
independence. The unit reflects an acute awareness that we need to ensure students are ready to
make their own way through longer and more complicated books, to find and form their own study
groups around reading, and to work through hard parts with a toolkit of strategies and a sense of
resiliency.
The unit is structured so students work in small book clubs, reading fantasy series. They’ll read
several novels, both so they become deeply immersed in this literary genre, and so they can develop
the kind of higher level thinking skills needed to study how authors develop characters and themes
over time. Indeed, whether students are reading Dragon Slayer’s Academy, Harry Potter, or The
Dark is Rising, they’ll synthesize details and make connections across hundreds of pages in this unit
of study.
There is an emphasis on transfer in this unit. The teacher introduces new work through a read
aloud of parts of a riveting fantasy novel for students (we suggest The Thief of Always or The
Lightning Thief), as well as a few short texts. Meanwhile, students will practice this work across the
several fantasy novels they read, each time exploring how the work differs slightly in different texts.
At the start of the unit, in Bend I, students will find that they need to read closely right away, as they
consider the work authors do at the very beginning of a novel to develop the setting as a physical
and psychological place. Beginning of the story comprehension work really matters in more
complex narratives, and so you’ll alert students to ways that novels become more challenging, and
lead your readers through more tricky narratives, teaching them, for instance, to learn alongside
the main character, and to suspend judgment as they carefully analyze scenes that introduce new
and complicated characters and places.
In Bend II, you’ll lead students to think metaphorically and analytically, teaching them to explore
the quests and themes within and across their novels. You’ll also lead students to engage ever more
deeply by considering the implications of the conflicts, themes, and lessons in the stories they read
for the lives students lead and want to lead.
As you move into Bend III, you’ll focus students on studying literary traditions, including
archetypes, quest structures, and symbolism. Finally, you lead readers to capitalize on their
expertise, studying how the thinking work developed through reading fantasy novels will pay off in
other genres as well. Expect students to read hundreds of pages, to think and talk like young
literary theorists, and to fall ever more in love with reading.
If you follow our curricular calendar, you may pair this unit with a study in fantasy writing, allowing
students to practice the story structure, character development, and attention to setting that they
are noticing in their reading.
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Teachers College Reading and Writing Project
Reading Curricular Calendar, Sixth Grade, 2016-2017
Fantasy Book Clubs
Overview
Essential Question: How can I tackle the demanding and complex genre of fantasy reading? What
will my strategies and goals be that help me to make sense of multiple plot lines, layered characters,
complex themes?

Bend I: Reading closely at the start of a book - learning to build the world of the story
when it’s another world
How can I learn to read closely at the start of a novel, paying careful attention to the role of
the setting, to multiple plotlines, and to new information as it arises? (one-two weeks)

Bend II: Developing thematic understanding—it’s about more than dwarfs and elves
How can I use all I have learned about how authors develop themes to study the way authors
approach common themes in fantasy? (one-two weeks)

Bend III: Literary traditions, including archetypes, quest structures, and thematic
patterns
How can I deepen my thoughts about fantasy stories by thinking about the choices the authors
have made—especially thinking about symbolism, allusion and craft? (one-two weeks)
Anchor Texts:
 The Paper Bag Princess by Robert Munsch
 Excerpts from The Thief of Always, by Clive Barker, or The Lightning Thief, by Rick Riordan
Alternates:
“The Third Wish,” by Joan Aiken
http://www.btboces.org/Downloads/4_The%20Third%20Wish%20by%20Joan%20Aiken.pdf
“The Giant’s Tooth,” by Bruce Colville (Kindle ebook $.99) or
http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/102155
Bend I: Reading closely at the start of a book - learning to build the world of the story when
it’s another world
In Bend One of the unit, readers will draw on all of the skills and strategies they have learned for
comprehension to synthesize across complex fantasies individually and with their club members.
Readers will pay close attention to details as they build the worlds of stories, considering what
these worlds are like both physically and psychologically. They will learn about the worlds of the
stories alongside the main characters and hold on using different tools as stories get more
complicated and plots and problems begin to multiply.
Bend II: Developing thematic understanding—it’s about more than dwarfs and elves
In Bend Two students will come to see fantasies as more than epic adventures but as symbolic of
larger themes and they will begin to think and talk about their fantasies metaphorically.
Bend III: Literary traditions, including archetypes, quest structures, and thematic patterns
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Teachers College Reading and Writing Project
Reading Curricular Calendar, Sixth Grade, 2016-2017
Fantasy Book Clubs
In Bend Three students will apply previous learning about themes and strengthen this work by
considering how different authors approach the grand themes found in fantasies, reading across
fantasies to discuss archetypal characters, craft of authors, elements of allusion, and so on. This
third bend will push students to draw on all the work they have done so far and become more
analytic about their fantasies, and thus we have suggested that you allot the most time for that bend
(keeping in mind, also, that you will always want to base your teaching on what your data shows
your students need).
We have found that in many classrooms, this analytic work is the work which students find the
most challenging and so spending more time on this teaching makes sense. You can also, of course,
return to earlier work during your small group and conferring across these later bends if your
students need more support.
CCSS/ LS Standards Addressed in this Unit
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In previous literature units, students tackled many of the reading literature standards and by the
time they enter this unit, your teaching has addressed each of the literature standards. This unit,
then, is a time to help students see how to apply the learning they have already done to a new
context and a new type of literature. Throughout the unit, you will be addressing a range of
Standards, including ones in Speaking and Listening, Reading Literature, Foundational Skills,
Writing, and Language. This unit does aim, though, to emphasize a few standards, in particular and
it is worth noting these. In previous units, students learned to compare and contrast characters,
settings, and events, and in this unit they will come to see these elements as symbolic (RL 6.3).
Throughout the unit, students will consider the role that characters and setting play and study how
authors have set up contrasts to help convey the larger messages of the story. This unit will also
place a special emphasis on deepening work with vocabulary and language. So much of fantasy is
about the symbolic use of language, plays on words and multiple meanings of words. Throughout
this unit students will focus on determining the meaning of unfamiliar words in context, including
figurative language (RL6.4), but also consider nuances of word meanings and relationships that
words play to the larger themes of the story. A third major focus of the unit will be in the area of
theme. As students are all engaged in reading within the same genre, they are able to do the
complex work of analyzing the way authors approach similar themes differently. In particular, in
the third bend, students will begin to compare and contrast elements of fantasies, explaining how
authors’ choices have led them to take a different angle on a theme or to say something else about a
theme that another author did not, work expected by Standard 6.9.
Getting Ready
As you prepare to teach this unit, the basic prep work that will be needed is to help students gather
fantasy series for their book clubs, and you need to gather books for your read aloud(s). If you are
able to gather other resources, in an ideal world you’ll gather a few other types of texts (film clips of
fantasy movies, audio clips of songs from fantasies).
This will mean enlisting the school librarian (if you have a school library), parents, and especially
students themselves during the weeks before the unit in collecting the right books so that clubs can
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Teachers College Reading and Writing Project
Reading Curricular Calendar, Sixth Grade, 2016-2017
Fantasy Book Clubs
all get to read at least two books by the same author. A book costs about the same as a soda and a
bag of chips, and it’s a better investment. A big change we’ve made in middle schools is teaching
kids how to get books - how to buy used copies, have bake sales, trade copies, read e-books, use the
library. Kids who know how to get books are more likely to continue to read outside of school.
Gathering and choosing books for read alouds and book clubs
There are so many fantasy series now, which is why this is a great book club unit. From Spiderwick
Chronicles, to the beloved Narnia, and Percy Jackson and the Olympians, there are wonderful choices
in this genre—and recently, terrific dystopian novels, for young readers as well. Get students
launched on a first book in a series, and they’ll undoubtedly keep going. One thing that is
particularly helpful about fantasy, for diverse classrooms, is that fantasy includes a range of levels
which allow all readers in the class, regardless of their instructional level to access the work. Many
of the lower level series (just check out Dragon Slayer’s Academy, for example) feature compelling,
complicated characters, intriguing subplots and symbolic images and objects. These lower level
series also feature characters who serve as archetypes and the same sorts of grand themes that
readers who read at higher levels will find in their books. And the higher levels allow your highest
level readers to read complicated narratives, without straying into plot developments that are not
appropriate for their age. Fantasy is a genre that supports all readers.
This is a good time to teach your students that powerful readers seek and get books! They scrounge
their classroom libraries. They go to the public library. They get e-books. They buy used books.
They trade with friends and family members, so that they can read the books they want with their
friends. Remember that these series are meant to be read in order.
For read-aloud, you’ll probably want to choose a novel and a short story. Good choices for novels to
excerpt are The Thief of Always, and The Lightning Thief, with the former being dense, but short.
(Note that if you have incoming sixth graders who were in elementary schools following our
reading curriculum, it’s likely they may have heard The Thief of Always as a read aloud. This isn’t
bad - you won’t be reading the whole thing anyway, and if some know the whole book, great. But
you will want to be prepared to say just that if kids say, “We’ve read this!”)
Collecting trailers and clips of popular fantasy movies
If you have access to a SMART board, computer or DVD player, you may find it engaging to show a
few trailers or clips of popular fantasy movies, such as Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, and Narnia,
as these brief clips vividly demonstrate the different settings of fantasy—how some start in the real
world and then magic infuses that world, and others are set in a magical world, that is usually
medieval, with horses, swords, dragons, and so forth. In future years, students will be expected to
compare film and print versions of stories and this is a great time to support them in beginning that
work. Students can look closely at the choices that filmmakers have made versus authors to
consider the differences and similarities in their effects on readers/viewers.
Another great resource to collect would be songs from fantasy films or shows. Wicked (a takeoff on
the Wizard of Oz) is a fantasy on Broadway with many songs that are ideal for interpretation work
(Unlimited, for example or For Good). So many of the songs play with the terms “good” and “bad”
and rely on multiple meanings of these words. Listening to and analyzing these songs can help
students do similar work of looking closely at the way authors have used language in their books.
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Teachers College Reading and Writing Project
Reading Curricular Calendar, Sixth Grade, 2016-2017
Fantasy Book Clubs
If you wish, prepare for literary centers
Centers have figured prominently in the RWP’s work around content area, as well as during test
prep. Centers are a powerful method of instruction which allows for intensive content and skill
knowledge while also maximizing student collaboration and independence. Typically, centers are
organized in baskets or some other receptacle (in some cases, this might be a cluster of laptops or a
desktop computer), spread around the room. Students go to a center with a small group of other
students. At each center there is a task card, which lets students know the work they can do at that
center. Any additional materials are also provided. Students typically rotate through centers so that
by the end of a set time period (a few weeks, a few days of a period) they will have visited most if
not all of the centers.
Centers are a highly engaging way to dump a lot of content or skill knowledge in a short amount of
time, while also freeing the teacher up to do focused small group work or coaching into the
content. For this unit we are imagining you could use centers as a method for helping students to
learn about and fantasy literary terms and traditions.
You’ll find examples of centers, some of which will work for this unit, on the thumb drive for
curricular materials, and also on Treasure Chest, available to schools that contract with TCRWP
throughout the year. Fantasy is a particularly apt genre for center work, as there are so many
examples of different kinds of texts and genre conventions available - centers are a way to allow for
digital texts, paintings or drawings to become part of the reading work that kids get to do. If you
develop additional centers and are willing to share, please send to
audra@readingandwritingproject.com and we will add to our digital collection.
Assessment
Are students reading?
The first thing you want to assess is your students’ overall engagement with reading. You can do
this through a quick in-class written inventory, in which you ask them to name a few favorite books
and authors, and tell you about their reading history. If your kids are reading, all your teaching will
stick. They’ll have a lot of pages to practice on, and they’ll continue to move up levels of
complexity. If they’re not reading, or they read below grade level, you want to find that out now.
Look at students’ reading notebooks and their reading logs or records, as well as any reading
assessments of reading level you’ve given, and help students reflect on how reading is going for
them. This is a good unit for helping kids increase their volume and move up levels, so have a base
line kids are starting from.
Do students read at grade level?
Pay attention to any kid who aren’t reading at grade level yet, and use this unit to introduce
students to new series that will help them move up bands of text complexity:
Secrets of Droon
Dragon Slayer’s Academy
Spiderwick Chronicles
(M-O)
(N-P)
(Q-R)
Tony Abbott
Kate McMullan
Black and DiTerlizzi
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Teachers College Reading and Writing Project
Reading Curricular Calendar, Sixth Grade, 2016-2017
Fantasy Book Clubs
The Edge Chronicles
City of Ember Series
Deltora Quest
Warriors
Narnia
Rowan of Rin
Animorphs
The Ranger’s Apprentice
Among the Hidden
Gregor The Overlander
Series of Unfortunate Events
Artemis Fowl
Percy Jackson and the Olympians
Divergent Trilogy
The Dark is Rising
The Mortal Instruments
Redwall
Harry Potter
The Golden Compass
Dragons of Pern
(R-U)
(R-U)
(R-T)
(R-S)
(T-U)
(T-V)
(T-U)
(T-U)
(U-V)
(U-V)
(U-V)
(W-X)
(U-W)
(W-X)
(X-Y)
(X-Y)
(Y-Z)
(V-Z)
(Y-Z)
(Z-Adult)
Stewart and Riddell
Jeanne DuPrau
Emily Rodda
Eric Hunter
C.S. Lewis
Emily Rodda
K.A. Applegate
John Flanagan
Margaret Peterson
Suzanne Collins
Lemony Skicket
Eoin Colfer
Rick Riordan
Veronica Roth
Susan Cooper
Cassandra Claire
Brian Jacques
J.K. Rowling
Phillip Pullman
Anne McCaffrey
Also pay attention to kids’ reading rates. Have them put some Post-its in their books, marking how
many pages they read in ten minutes, and then in half an hour. Gradually build up to forty minutes,
to see how they maintain stamina over longer periods. You’re looking for most sixth graders who
read at grade level (levels V-Y across the year) to average around forty to sixty pages a day, as many
days a week as possible. That would be about twenty-five pages in school and twenty-five at home
minimum. If they need more time to read, so be it, help them to carve out more time for reading
outside of school. Volume will help increase their rate and develop their stamina, and in the long
run will also help their fluency and comprehension.
Are kids able to show their analytic reading skills through performance assessment?
You might want to do a very simple pre and post-performance assessment. You and your colleagues
may want to agree upon a few texts to use in such an assessment - such as short stories or opening
chapters by the authors under study. Plan stopping places so that every student reads to the predetermined spot, then ask students to stop and jot in ways that show what they have gleaned from
the text about characters’ traits, for example. Ask them to support their ideas with evidence from
the text. Then they can read a bit more; this time you might pause to ask at an important part:
“What does this particular part suggest about how this character is changing?” You might have
another spot where you ask them to write about the author’s style or craft and what makes it
recognizable. You don’t need to do all of these - the main thing is, you want to assess how your
students synthesize detail and attend to craft before and after the unit. This assessment will give
you a window into your kids’ analytical skills.
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Reading Curricular Calendar, Sixth Grade, 2016-2017
Fantasy Book Clubs
Bend I: Thinking Analytically at the Start of a Book - Learning to Build
the World of the Story When It’s Another World
Introduce the genre, teaching children a couple of strategies for generating story ideas
The goal of this bend is for readers to use all the strategies for holding onto and monitoring for
comprehension as they are reading what will likely be more complex and complicated fantasies
than they have encountered before. As they launch into reading fantasies with great enthusiasm,
they’ll quickly become enmeshed in multiple subplots and characters and it will be helpful for them
to develop and try out tools to help them hold onto the worlds of the fantasies. This is work that
students will likely have done before as they learned to hold onto the worlds of their realistic fiction
novels earlier in the year, but fantasies typically contain even more characters and many more
setting details. Thus, you’ll want to remind students that they have already learned these strategies
and help them to apply these tools to this new type of reading work.
Bend I, Session One: Reading closely at the start of a story
For the first few sessions, and some sessions across the unit, you may want to use an actual fantasy
novel as your read aloud and anchor text - just excerpts, as you won’t have time to read all of it. This
could be one some clubs are reading as well. You’ll want to be able to help readers navigate the
density of whole novels, which is what they’re reading. Later, you can move to reading short stories
that follow in the genre of fantasy, as close reading work will pay off there and still transfer to clubs’
novel reading as well.
You might launch your unit by gathering students around your many fantasy novels, their covers
adorned with dragons, castles, and symbols. Gesture to these books as you tell your readers that in
these tales the fate of all of mankind may rest on the choices made by the main character.
Everything is more important, more intense, more vivid in fantasy stories. Explain that when we
study fantasy, really, we are studying the human condition. The stories are never really about elves
and hobbits. They’re about the struggle between good and evil, they’re about how power
sometimes corrupts, they’re about the quest to be better than we are, and they’re about how even
the smallest of us can affect what happens in this world. Finally, by giving your students a vision of
where they’re heading as readers, you can explain that as we become powerful readers of fantasy,
we’re likely to become more powerful readers of all texts.
Your readers will be eager to pick up these novels and get started. It is important that students
determine the kind of place in which their story is happening. Because the novels are so
complicated, you’ll want to teach students that fantasy readers use multiple resources to research
the settings of our stories. We look for clues about the place and the magical elements, in
particular, using the cover, blurbs, and details from the beginning of the story for our research. You
might demonstrate how you synthesize these details from the cover of a book such as The Thief of
Always then let your students try doing so using Dragon Slayer’s Academy, or The Dark is Rising, or
any of the books you have gathered.
Any close reading work that you have done in the past will be especially helpful here. Having kids
hold on to multiple details from a text, looking for patterns. Looking closely at one word the author
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Reading Curricular Calendar, Sixth Grade, 2016-2017
Fantasy Book Clubs
uses to describe a character and asking, “why that one word?” keeping an eye out for author’s craft
- all of these skills will be useful as your students begin a journey into fantasy.
“Today I want to teach you that fantasy readers know to read closely at the start of a book,
asking, “What kind of place is this?” Fantasy readers look for clues about the setting and
the magical elements, in particular, using the covers, blurbs, and details from the beginning
of the story for their research.”
Bend I, Session Two: Analyzing the setting as a psychological site
If your students are adept at constructing the setting in their stories, particularly if they have done
this work in historical fiction, or they are already avid fantasy readers, then take this teaching to the
next level by teaching them how to analyze the setting for its psychological implications as well as
its physical. In The Lightning Thief, the setting of the museum is so important to Percy’s realization
that Mrs. Dodds is not just some substitute teacher - the backdrop of the Greek and Roman art are
previewing themes that will continue through the whole series! It’s easy to read past setting, so
you’ll want to alert readers to not do this, even though it’s so tempting to read for plot and not
notice the surroundings. As you set students up to think about the atmosphere of the setting, show
them how to not simply describe it, but to analyze it, so that you lift their work to the level that the
Common Core requires. Students in sixth grade are expected to compare and contrast settings so
students will come to see that in many fantasies there are multiple settings, each with its own
psychological and physical elements.
Of course, this work is most easily begun in the land of emotions. Demonstrate how you read a
description of setting in a fantasy text, like the outside of the museum in the first chapter of The
Lightning Thief, where the storm is brewing, showing how you notice not just what that place looks
like, but also how it feels. This foray into the emotional life of a setting will allow your students to
start thinking about tone.
“Today I want to teach you that fantasy readers consider the setting not only as a physical
setting but also as a psychological one. They analyze the mood, asking how the author
develops the setting.”
Bend I, Session Three: Investigating power early in the novel
As your readers investigate the setting in their novels, teach them to be alert to who has
power. There will be different kinds of power - teach your readers to look for signs of power, and
to trace the various kinds of power they see across their novels. For example they might notice who
in their books has the ability to choose what they do - in a day or with their lives. Who has overt
power - like a King - and how do they wield it? Who resents that power and who accepts it and
why? Who desires power, and when does that seem to be a good thing, and when does that desire
become dangerous? Students can track the acquisition and loss of power between different
characters across a text, and can start to pay close attention to what this particular book is saying
about power in societies, as well as power between people in relationships.
If your sixth grader find this conversation confusing, you can divert them to a character study,
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Fantasy Book Clubs
pointing out that fantasy, like any fiction text, is rife with characters that beg for analysis. Bring
back charts and teaching points from your earlier unit on character to help you students reinforce
those skills.
“Today I want to teach you that fantasy readers investigate power in their novels, asking
who has power, and analyzing the visible signs of power in its different forms.
Bend I, Session Four: Learning alongside the main character
Next, you may teach your students that fantasy readers expect to learn alongside the main
character. Often parts seem confusing as the main character too is confused by what is happening.
In many fantasies, the hero or heroine is naive at the start, drawn into a world full of dangerous
(and sometimes political) problems. The main character is dropped into that world and must make
sense of it and so must the confused reader. At the start of The Lightning Thief Percy doesn’t
understand why Mrs. Dodds tries to kill him and neither do we. In The Thief of Always, we’re not
sure if the house is good or evil. Yet, as we continue reading, this earlier confusing scene takes on
more significance and we understand more clearly. We begin to see how the pieces are fitting
together.
As readers read fantasies with multiple plots, jumps in time, and deliberately confusing scenes, they
need to learn how the parts of the story fit together, referring to earlier parts of the text as these
now take on greater significance. In other words, students need to be able to “Explain how a series
of chapters, scenes, or stanzas fit together to provide the overall structure of a particular story,
drama or poem.”
You can teach this effectively by building on students’ experiences and knowledge of character.
Often the main character sets out on an adventure, and has to figure out what the rules are about
the place where that adventure, or quest, takes place. Harry has to learn about Hogwarts and the
magical world. Percy has to learn about half-bloods. Wiglaf has to learn about Dragon Slayer’s
Academy and its greedy principal. As these characters learn, visibly, about the values, beliefs, and
customs of this place, the reader is supposed to learn as well. It’s one way the author educates the
reader, through the explicit learning experiences of the character. Many younger readers don’t
realize that there are clues in complex novels that alert them to times when they should sit up and
take notice, because an important bit of information is going to be conveyed.
For your stronger readers, you may also show them how in complex novels, sometimes the reader
synthesizes information ahead of the character—that is, our understanding comes before the main
character, as we infer more rapidly than he or she. It’s the way readers knew that Bella, in Twilight,
was in love with a vampire before she knew that, or realized that Harry himself was perhaps a
horcrux, before Harry did, in Harry Potter.
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Fantasy Book Clubs
“Today I want to teach you that in complicated stories such as these fantasy novels, often the
main characters begin without a lot of knowledge, and they have a steep learning curve.
When the main characters are told important information or have new and unfamiliar
experiences, alert readers see those moments in the story as opportunities not only for the
characters to learn but for them to learn hand in hand with the main characters.”
Bend I, Session Five: Tackling hard vocabulary by studying patterns, word families, and Latin
roots
Another aspect of fantasies that may give readers some difficulty at the start is the language. As
students read their fantasies, they will likely encounter unfamiliar terms (e.g. minstrel), perhaps
even words that were invented by the author of their fantasy (e.g. Wookie; Muggle). It might be
worthwhile, then, make sure you dedicate instruction to the particular task of understanding the
language, archaic, invented, complicated, that is one of the hallmarks of the challenge of reading
fantasy.
“Today I want to teach you that that knowledgeable readers expect fantasy novels to
incorporate challenging vocabulary. Readers, then, study the way that writers use words
again and again, they consider the significance of word families, and they become familiar
with Latin roots to help figure out meaning.”
You will likely want to help students deal with unfamiliar terms first through envisioning and
making sense of the words in the context of what is happening in the story - especially as fantasy
writers tend to use words again and again. For example, in Harry Potter, the word Muggle is
repeated and though at first it is meant to be a deliberately confusing term, the reader can pay
attention to how and when the term is used in order to get more information about what it really
means. You can show students how it will be important to pay attention to how the word is used in
order to figure out the type of term it is. For example if Draco Malfoy “looks down his nose at
Hermione” and calls her a “Muggle,” readers get the clue that the term is one of disrespect and later
find out while it means one who is not a wizard or witch, it is also an insult. This repeating of key
terms is a common technique---look at how “half-blood” is repeated twice in the first paragraph of
The Lighting Thief, for example.
Study word families and Latin roots as well, and you’ll see that many fantasy writers create words
using Latin origins (Lumos, in Harry Potter, for example, or Mr. Canis, the Big Bad Wolf in Sisters
Grimm). This is a good time for a quick study of the most common Latin roots.
Some ideas for small group instruction around vocabulary
For students who have the most difficulty in determining the meaning of terms, you might want to
set them up for success by working through the first chapter of their text with them. Begin to read
aloud to the students and demonstrate how you encounter unfamiliar terms then use clues to help
you to continue to figure out what is happening in the story. So, for example, if you have a group of
students who are reading at what is considered below grade level and they are beginning the first
book in the Dragon Slayer’s Academy, you can read aloud the first few pages, pausing right after the
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second sentence to show students how you start doing work to figure out unfamiliar terms
immediately.
“Who’s there?” Fergus bellowed from inside the hovel.
Right here you might stop and say, “Hmm...I’m not sure what hovel means, but I see that Fergus is
inside of it so it must be a place of some kind. I’ll read on to get more information about what he is
inside of. By the next page, you’ll come across information that the “whole hovel was but one
cramped room which he shared with Morwena and their thirteen sons” and you can here stop,
triumphantly and begin to fill in your vision of where Fergus is. “Okay, so a hovel is only one room
so he lives someplace really small with a ton of people so it’s really crowded! Wow, let me picture
that for a minute.” You can do similar work with the term “minstrel” as well as help students use the
illustration to help them get further information to help determine the meaning of “lute.” After a
few pages (around page four) you can stop and tell the students, “We’ve come across a bunch of
terms we had to do a lot of work to figure out. When that happens and you have a handful of words
that are kind of unfamiliar, you want to stop and then summarize what has happened to make sure
you’re understanding the story. So let’s stop here and make sure we can summarize what’s
happening.” In addition, you can help them to use these terms. “As we summarize the story, let’s try
to use the vocabulary we’re encountering. The minstrel is ‘shouldering’ the lute, it says. So let’s use
that term in our conversation instead of just plain old, ‘carrying’.”
For your higher level readers, you can do similar work, involving them rereading the first few pages
of a text like The Lightning Thief and pausing after that first paragraph to consider what terms the
author wants to forward and how those terms are being used. So you might say, “Not only is Percy
using this term ‘half-blood’ in a really confusing way, he’s letting us know that it’s something that
you are and it’s dangerous and sort of out of your control and special to be a half-blood. Let’s write
all that down in our notebooks and pay careful attention to what other clues the author gives us
about this term.”
Some students may be encountering unfamiliar terms with history behind them (for example, the
Lightning Thief constantly refers to gods and goddesses, mythological monsters, and so on). These
students might find it helpful to also have a copy of a book on myths (D'Aulaires' Book of Greek
Myths, for example) beside them as they read. Students who are reading other series may find a
dictionary of mythical creatures helpful.
Bend I, Session Six: Literary centers, first rotation
Today you may decide to introduce literary centers relevant to Fantasy reading. See Unit 2 for a
write-up of how you might set this up to go well! This is a placeholder - you’ll decide if now is the
time for this, with kids visiting just one center today, and rotating to different ones in future
sessions, or if you save Centers for later in the unit, and have kids rotate through all of them in a
single, longer time frame. Of course, you may decide not to do this, and to instead incorporate this
kind of work into small groups that you lead. Up to you!
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Bend II: Developing Thematic Understanding—It’s About More Than
Dwarfs and Elves
Now that students are reading, attending to small details and building worlds of the stories and
their notebooks are full of tools to help them hold onto their comprehension, they will begin
reading to do the deeper thematic work that will let them consider the larger meanings of
fantasies.
In Bend Two, then, students will come to see fantasies as more than epic adventures but as
symbolic of larger themes and they will begin to think and talk about their books metaphorically.
Bend II, Session One: Developing thematic understanding
Perhaps some of the most powerful work fantasy calls readers to do, and the work students are
most likely to skip without explicit instruction, is the work around developing thematic
understanding. You might begin this part of the unit by showing an image from an old map which
includes that famous term "Here be Dragons," such as The Carta Marina. There are zillions of
images online, such as sea monsters attacking ships, in places the mariners considered dangerous.
The Lenox Globe, of which there are also zillions of online images, was the first map to include the
phrase "Here be Dragons." You might explain to your students how this phrase, and these maps,
show how early map makers were depicting their literal understanding of the world, as well as
their metaphoric understanding that it was dangerous. "Here be Dragons" symbolized the host of
unknown dangers that travelers might encounter.
You may decide to read aloud a whole story today (perhaps “The Dragon’s Tooth,” by Bruce
Colville or “The Third Wish,” by Joan Aiken. This will give you a complete text to talk about - which
is helpful, as symbolism often doesn’t pay off totally until the end of a work of literature, or it shifts
its significance across a story, and you just won’t have time to get through a whole novel as a read
aloud. But a short story will allow you to teach the art of noticing how symbols change across a
text, and show this quickly!
Specifically, teach your students that some of the dragons that characters face are metaphoric
dragons (as are the hero’s powers). Students will begin to think metaphorically, considering the
dragons that characters face (both metaphorical and physical) and how these dragons drive the
characters. One way readers explore these "dragons" is to consider the inner struggles that
characters face. These are the conflicts inside a character’s soul that haunt that character. For
further support in teaching this lesson see session V starting on page 223 in the unit “Learning from
the Elves,” in the volume, Constructing Curriculum of the series, Units of Study for Teaching Reading
Grades 3-5).
“Readers, today I want to teach you that in stories you are reading, the characters face
dragons- not just literal dragons, which some fantasy characters do encounter, but also
metaphoric dragons, which are the conflicts inside characters’ souls that haunt them.
Powerful fantasy readers learn to think metaphorically about these dragons’.”
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You might encourage book clubs to think about the "dragons" in their own lives, as well as the lives
of their characters. After all, one reason we participate in book clubs is so that we come to know
each other better through the books that we read.
The Common Core explicitly states that students in sixth grade are expected to be able to study
characters’ responses to struggles and consider not only what those responses say about characters
but also about the larger meanings of the text. Your students have heard this before in earlier units.
But you will want to watch how they pay attention to the different characters’ troubles and
consider what each character struggles with and how those different struggles influence the other
characters as well as convey larger meanings. Students might ask questions of themselves and
others such as:




How do the different characters respond to trouble?
What lessons does the character seem to learn? How?
What lessons can we learn from how the character responds?
What do the characters’ struggles say about the larger meanings?
Bend II, Session Two: Analyzing how authors develop themes
From thinking about the "dragons" that characters face, you can then move to teaching students
that readers ask ourselves: "What is this story really about?" We realize that there are underlying
themes and life-lessons in the stories we are reading and we pay attention to how authors develop
these themes. Turn to your read-aloud story, and you may also discuss some of the underlying
themes of popular fantasy stories such as Harry Potter, the Narnia books, and The Lord of the Rings.
“Readers, today I want to teach you, that often, with great stories, the plot is the vehicle for
teaching about ideas. Insightful readers consider how the author develops themes across a
narrative, including by connecting scenes.”
You might, for instance, describe how fantasy readers know that The Lion, the Witch and the
Wardrobe isn’t just about witches and fauns. This story is about the struggle between good and
evil. It's about how power corrupts. And it's about how the physically strong can use their gifts to
protect others. This story is about how even the smallest and physically weakest can find moral
strength to defeat evil. It's about love and how love drives us to be better than we are. This story—
and other fantasy stories, too—encompasses all of these complex, essential themes. That’s why we
read these stories! Teach your readers that in their clubs, they can move from retelling what
happens in their books, to investigating the underlying themes that the story seems to suggest.
They’ll begin to see that stories are about more than one idea, and that ideas run across multiple
stories—which is how you’ll know that your readers are developing thematic understanding.
Bend II, Session Three: Investigating dominant themes
As your readers begin to recognize the struggles between good and evil in their novels, you can
teach them about the internal struggle for good and evil that many characters suffer. One thing that
happens in fantasy novels, that is unusual for students’ fiction, is that characters are sometimes
unpredictable, or even deceptive, because they struggle between good and evil. Luke, in the
Lightning Thief, turns out to be trouble despite his charming persona. Snape, in Harry Potter, turns
out to be heroic despite his nasty personality. Teach your readers that characters are
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Fantasy Book Clubs
complicated—they are usually more than one way—and experienced readers, knowing this, are
alert for the character flaws in the hero and the admirable traits in the villain.
“Readers, today I want to teach you that often, in fantasy novels, a dominant theme emerges
of a struggle between good and evil. Knowledgeable readers often analyze how that theme
plays out in their particular novels.”
Bend II, Session Four: Analyzing inner as well as outer struggles
You’ll also want to remind your readers to do the work they do in any novel, such as to pay
attention to the inner as well as the outer struggles of their characters. In fantasy novels, as with
many complex novels, the characters face more than one struggle. Some of their struggles are
placed on them from the outside. Harry struggles and battles with Voldemort, for instance. But
some of their struggles are internal, such as the way Harry misses his parents so much. You’ll want,
therefore, to teach readers to track the multiple problems faced by characters. There are also
grander cohorts of characters, so that it’s productive to examine a few of the major characters,
paying close attention to the pressures they suffer, the forces that are exerted on them and by them,
the relationships they make, all the intricacies of their complicated inner lives. Sometimes the
problems of one character, for instance, affect the other characters. Sometimes the emotional
conflicts of one character affect another.
“Today I want to teach you that fantasy readers are alert to the inner as well as the outer
struggles of characters. They pay attention, for example, to the small details that
demonstrate a character is haunted by his or her past, or by character flaws.”
Remind students of questions they learned to ask themselves and others in earlier units. You’ll
want to go back to the charts of questions you put up during your character and historical fiction
units. For example, here are a few questions that students likely began asking each other earlier
this year and will want to continue asking:







How does this character respond to those obstacles?
What resources does the character draw upon, from deep inside, to meet the challenges and
reach the goals?
How does _____character feel toward _____(other characters/a particular situation)? Why?
Which sentence from the story explains how it could be that _____________ (inference about a
character’s actions)?
Which sentence from the story explains why ______?
How are the characters similar and different from each other? How do they seem to
influence each other?
How does the setting in your book influence the main character?
Bend II, Session Five: Analyzing point of view
You might also use this time to again teach students about the role of the narrator’s point of view,
and how it influences the way events in a novel are described. Building on what they already
know—that texts will be told very differently when they are told by a character within the story or
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a removed outsider—you will then help them to see that the choice of who tells the story is a
deliberate one made by the author and for good reason.
“Readers, today I want to teach you that often the narrator’s point of view dramatically
influences how events are described in a novel. Experienced readers analyze the narrator’s
point of view, including how it is shown, and how it affects the story.”
You might ask your readers to consider how Harry Potter might have been told otherwise if Harry
himself had told parts. What would be changed? What would be lost or gained in those different
choices? Students can compare this narration to the first person narration in The Lightning Thief.
Percy tells his own story. How does that influence the mood and tone of parts of the story? How
does that influence the way events are told? You can show students that the author might have
made this choice to put the reader in the same place as Percy--totally confused. A third person
narrator would likely have more understanding and the story would lose the tension between what
is happening and the reader (and Percy’s) confusion about events. By starting this work on texts
where the narrator is evident and there are more overt reasons for why an authorial decision has
been made, students will be able to transfer and apply analysis of the narrator to their own texts.
Bend II, Session Six: Dealing with multiple plotlines
One thing you’ll begin to notice with your readers is that even as a character seems to solve one
problem, another arises. Or the original problem turns out to have many parts. Basically, the plot
lines begin to multiply in these novels, within the book, and across the series. One way readers keep
track of the characters, problems, and storylines is we use charts, timelines, and other graphic
organizers, just as they might have done when reading nonfiction or, in earlier years, in historic
fiction.
“Readers, as you tackle more and more complicated books, the stories will begin to have
multiple plotlines. This means that the main characters will have more than one problem
and that problems will arise for other characters, and it also means that the problems will
not be resolved by the end of a story. Often readers find it helpful to use charts, timelines
and other graphic organizers to track the problems that arise in a story in order to follow
the multiple plot lines.”
You may want to teach your readers, therefore, that alert readers often use a pencil as we read, so
that we can jot lists of characters, timelines, maps, make sketches and so forth. You can model this
work through your read-aloud text, for which you and your students will probably create some of
these learning tools. Students will work in clubs and use their reading notebooks to try out a variety
of tools to help them hold onto the world of the story. You can also have a teaching share, where
club members leave open their notebooks to a favorite page, and then students do a gallery walk
looking at what other readers have done for ideas for how they, too, might use their pencil
effectively and swiftly as they read.
Bend II, Session Seven: Centers
Here would be another opportunity for centers, if you wish.
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Bend III: Literary Traditions, Including Archetypes, Quest Structures, and
Thematic Patterns
As the unit progresses, students will be speaking about the themes they see running through their
various fantasies and continuing to work to synthesize complicated texts. In Bend Three you’ll
raise the level of their work even further by pushing them to consider the literary traditions found
in fantasies and begin to compare and contrast the ways that different authors develop fantasies.
For an anchor text this round, you may continue to refer to texts you’ve already introduced, and
also turn to a simple picture book, such as The Paper Bag Princess, as a way to be able to quickly
practice some critical reading of familiar fantasy themes and structures.
Students will apply previous learning about themes and strengthen this work by considering how
different authors approach the grand themes found in fantasies, reading across fantasies to discuss
archetypal characters, craft of authors and elements of allusion.
Bend III, Session One: Analyzing archetypes
A predictable aspect of fantasy novels is that the characters often play expected roles in the story.
Teach your readers that the main character is usually the hero of the story. But common herotypes include the traditional hero, such as Prince Caspian; the reluctant, or everyday hero, the
ordinary person who finds herself swept into great events, such as Harry Potter; and the anti-hero,
who usually has several non-heroic traits. She may cheat, or lie, or steal, or be cruel. Yet she plays a
heroic part in the drama. Snape is that kind of anti-hero, as is Sinbad, or Puck in the Sisters Grimm.
Other common character roles in fantasy include the mentor, who teaches and guides the young
hero; the companions, who usually accompany the hero on the quest; and the villain, who is often
disguised and can even appear to some to be benevolent, like the Queen in Narnia.
Just before Book Six of Harry Potter was released—Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, there
was a lot of press about it. Someone from the publisher had leaked that a major character would
die in the novel. Fans everywhere met and surmised who it would be. Would it be Ron, Harry’s
volatile best friend? Would it be Hagrid, the loyal gamekeeper at Hogwarts? Would it be malevolent
Professor Snape, who detests Harry? Avid young fantasy readers, though, were convinced that it
would be Dumbledore who would die. They reasoned that Dumbledore had to die because he’s the
mentor, and the mentor has to die so the hero can come of age. They were right. They understood
about archetypes and narrative structures.
We suggest you bring in film clips of other fantasy and dystopian stories that students will be
familiar with - Harry Potter, The Lightning Thief, even Frozen might have a place. You can then teach
your students that experienced readers of genre often consider the role that characters play in a
story, thinking about them as archetypes, or as particular kinds of agents in literature. Students
might brainstorm in clubs various characters that they have seen versions of again and again. Some
students might know the archetypical name for these characters—if so, chart that name. If not, you
can provide it. In this way, Ares, Ursula the Seawitch, Voldemort become grouped together as
archetypical villains, while Dumbledore, Gandalf, and Haymitch are dubbed the mentors.
If you choose to read The Paper Bag Princess here (it’s quite short, so you could likely show some
clips and still have time to read the story, talk about archetypes, then send kids to read with this
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new lens for another 15 minutes of class), both Elizabeth and the Dragon could be interesting to
discuss with this lens.
“Today I want to teach you that readers often notice the structure of a text and how stories
and certain literary traditions often have similar structures. Fantasy and dystopian readers
are especially alert to quest structures, and they look for how a quest may be physical or
psychological.”
Other archetypes they might notice, or you might feel important to highlight, include: the sidekick,
the consort, the hero, the scapegoat, the mother figure and so on. On this day, clubs might lay out
each of the texts they’ve read so far, alongside the anchor texts. They can then compare characters
with this lens, analyzing how different authors develop certain archetypes, including when
characters are not totally consistent. You might also want to entertain a mid-workshop inquiry for
students who are particularly fascinated by the concept of archetypical characters: why would an
author use them? What work does it do for the story and the genre when they are used?
Bend III, Session Two: Analyzing quest structures - internal quests as well as external
Fantasy and dystopian readers are especially alert to quest structures, and they study both the
external quests characters are on and their internal ones. To do this work, readers pay attention to
detail, and to structure. It’s often helpful, for instance, to make timelines of the internal and
external quests of characters.
Today I want to teach you that fantasy readers are alert to the internal as well as the
external quests characters are on. They notice and accumulate the small details and the
overall structures that reveal character’s quests.”
Most fantasy stories follow a quest narrative structure. This means that the hero is given a quest,
which means he or she must journey to achieve something. Sometimes the quest involves rescuing
a captive or a sacred object, as with Shrek or Sinbad. Other times the quest may require the hero to
destroy a villain or a dangerous object, as with The Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter. A third
common quest narrative is one in which the hero has entered another world or place, and must
now find a way out; the quest is the journey out of there, as with Alice in Wonderland.
Bend III, Session Three: Considering how authors play with archetypes
Readers can start to consider how authors have created similar characters but developed them in
different ways and what those choices mean for how themes are conveyed. How is Percy as a hero
different than Harry? How is Voldemort in the Harry Potter series as a villain different than Saint
Dane in the Pendragon series? What choices have authors made about how to develop these
archetypal characters? What does that show us about the way they approach themes? It is this
analytic work that will move students to the highest level of thinking of about their fantasies.
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“Readers look for how authors play with archetypes. To do this work, readers compare
and contrast characters across novels, noting the ways they are similar and different, and
how they fulfill or break with archetypes.”
Bend III, Session Four: Comparing themes across texts
Finally, you might want to encourage your readers to re-examine the themes in their books,
thinking across texts. One common aspect of fantasy stories is that they are almost always about
the epic struggle between good and evil, and in fantasy, by the end, good triumphs. In this way,
fantasy stories are moral triumphs. They preach that people are inherently good. They
demonstrate that the struggle against injustice is worth it, no matter how arduous the journey is. A
common theme in these fantasy novels, though, is that the character has to overcome internal
struggles and embrace his or her essential goodness in order for good to triumph for all. Selfsacrifice, thus, is one of the most important themes in fantasy. The hero must put him or herself in
danger’s way. That’s one reason these stories are so inspiring. Your readers will begin to see why
these stories are so stirring, as they begin to recognize recurring themes and literary traditions.
Teach your readers to ask which themes appear in more than one text - and then to investigate the
small differences in how these themes play out. To further support your readers, you might begin
a bank of themes which seem common across multiple fantasies and visually display these themes
so that readers have the language to discuss what they are seeing in their own books and can build
a repertoire of themes.
Some common themes in fantasies
*Those who have been hurt can be the most dangerous
*We all have the potential for goodness and evil in us and can choose which side to be on
*There is more power inside of us than we realize
*Sometimes in life we hold ourselves back from our fullest potentials
*Sometimes in life when one betrays a friend, one needs to pay for that betrayal
*Sometimes innocent characters sacrifice themselves to save others
And as all fantasies have similarities, they also have differences.
“Today I want to teach you that while the same sorts of themes and characters run across
many fantasies, each author has made very specific choices and approached these themes
differently. We can hold up two similar characters or two similar plot patterns up and
ask, “What choices has each author made to develop these differently?”
Readers can push themselves to consider how even similar themes are approached differently by
different authors. Harry Potter and Percy both learn to accept things they cannot change, but Percy
specifically learns that he must accept his father despite the fact that he is not present in his life
and Harry learns that he must accept that though his parents are gone, they will always be with
him in heart. Both these stories teach that it is wrong to think of yourself before you think of
others.
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Here you will likely want to be sure students are drawing on different ways of considering how
authors are approaching themes. You will likely want to bring some of the charts back from
previous units, such as this one from historical fiction:
We Can Analyze How Different Authors Approach Themes by Comparing and Contrasting
 moments of choice
 times when character(s) respond to trouble
 moments when characters feel conflicting emotions
 perspectives authors have chosen
 physical and psychological settings
 parts where images, objects, etc. seem to resurface
 parts where minor, seemingly unimportant characters resurface
 choices of language (e.g. names of titles, characters, places) and how this language might
connect to the themes of the story)
 how life lessons are taught (some are taught through characters themselves realizing
lessons while others are taught through readers seeing characters’ mistakes/flaws)
And Asking:
 What can I learn from these moments?
 What does each author seem to be trying to really say?
 How is each author approaching a theme in his/her own way?
Bend III, Session Five: Reading with critical lenses
There is one more lens that you might want to teach your readers to put on as they move forward
with fantasy reading. That is to read with critical lenses. You might want to begin by showing
images of Disney characters, such as the Little Mermaid, Cinderella, and so forth. It doesn’t take long
to see that all these characters get to be brave and strong, but they all also have to be beautiful. Only
beautiful girls get to be heroines in Disney. Then, teach your students that one way readers analyze
stories is with critical lenses, being alert to stereotypes and gender norms.
You might look at how Erica, the cross-dressing-undercover-female-dragon-slayer in Dragon Slayer
Academy, breaks out of girl stereotypes such as wanting to wear dresses and play with dolls. You
might recall Annabeth from The Lightning Thief and her fierceness. You might discuss the
complicated ways that females are portrayed in Frozen. You may teach your readers that we can
analyze a character by his or her appearance and his or her actions. Readers ask ourselves: "Does
this character fit with common stereotypes?"
“Readers, today I want to teach you that one way readers analyze a story is to read with
critical lenses for stereotypes and gender norms, or rules. One way to do this work is to
consider characters’ actions and appearances.”
Bend III, Session Six: Deepening reading of all genres
Finally, you’ll want to be sure to make time at the end of the unit for readers to reflect on what
reading practices they’ve honed in reading fantasy that they can use in other genres. Hopefully your
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readers have come to love series, they’ve learned to seek books avidly, they’ve practiced preparing
for book club conversations, they’ve learned to investigate complicated characters and track
multiple plotlines, and they’ve developed thematic understandings across texts.
All of this reading work will pay off in other genres! Lots of characters in realistic fiction, for
instance, have "dragons." Many face more than one problem. Characters in realistic and historical
fiction often go on quests, face obstacles, learn how to be strong, and turn out to be reluctant
heroes. So teach your readers that we make opportunities to reflect on our work and make plans
for how to incorporate and extend it.
“Readers, today I want to teach you readers consider how they can bring what they’ve
learned from studying one genre, to deepen their analytical reader of other genres.”
You will want to wrap up the unit having students looking back across their logs, reading notebooks
and other artifacts from their reading lives in sixth grade to see what goals they have met and what
they have yet to achieve. You might teach that when readers find success they build upon that
success to make goals. Teach students how to create their own book lists and then how to gather
the books to go with them. Be sure to connect students with fantasy series and authors who tend to
write addictive books and books that tend to be on levels that stay consistent throughout the series.
You might have your students help you to create a class recommendation book list or bulletin board
to help make the transfer from beloved fantasy novels to other genres or authors. “If you liked The
Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, you might like Bridge to Terabithia.” If you liked The Dark is
Rising you might like The Giver,” your students’ book tips might read.
Finally, you might decide to have an end of the unit celebration. Students might find it interesting
to reflect on what they learned about fantasy as readers and as people. This might be particularly
true for students who are nervous about leaving sixth grade and moving up to seventh. For many
students, the metaphoric nature of fantasy might be exactly what they need to talk through their
fears and excitement about traveling from their now familiar world to this strange new land.
Appendix
See the following pages for an example of how instruction and club work might go for Bends I and
II.
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Bend One: Fantasy Book Clubs
Anchor Text: Excerpts from Thief of Always or Lightning Thief
Session/Minilesson
Conferring and Small Group
1
Introduction to genre and read aloud of a first chapter.
Fantasy readers know to read closely at the start of a book,
asking, “What kind of place is this?” Fantasy readers look for clues
about the setting and the magical elements, in particular.
Mid-Workshop Teaching
Readers start to add the details
together, beginning to make
inferences about the setting, the
rules of magic, and the characters.
Share
Club discusses what this story is
starting to suggest about the
setting, the rules of magic, and the
characters.
2
Fantasy readers consider
the setting not only as a
physical setting but also as
a psychological one. They
analyze the mood, asking
how the author develops
the setting.
1. Noticing authors craft as a
window to tone.
2. Empathy work – asking “How
would I feel here?”
3. Noticing when setting changes in
a book – and noticing the
difference in tone.
Inquiry into the elements of
fantasy using video clip (HP)
Talk to club comparing their ideas.
Club compares tones in different
settings in the book.
3
Fantasy readers investigate
power in their novels,
asking who has power, and
analyzing the visible signs
of power in its different
forms
Readers examine when power is
dangerous, and when it is useful,
according to the books they are
reading.
Clubs discuss when power is
dangerous, and when it is useful,
according to the books they are
reading.
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Readers see the moments
when characters learn new
information or have new
experiences as
opportunities not only for
the characters to learn but
for them to learn hand in
hand with the main
characters.
Fantasy novels incorporate
challenging vocabulary that
readers can make sense of
by envisioning to make
sense of hard words.
1. Places to look for power =
society, family, friendships
2. Thinking about character traits
for kids who are not ready for
power.
3. Power in fantasy is good and bad
we can look at each ex. and analyze
1. How is the character changing =
what they are learning.
2. Internal vs. External change…it’s
the internal we can learn from.
3. Finding connections to our own
life.
Readers ask - what values or
beliefs are honored in this story?
What is right and wrong?
Club discusses what values are
embedded in the story so far and
whether they agree with those
beliefs.
1. Substitute the word.
2. Find the part of the word you
know.
3. Latin/Greek roots lesson.
Paying attention to the new, worldspecific words the author is
teaching us.
Clubs makes a list of new worldspecific words the author is
teaching them, and notes the
challenging vocab they grappled
with that day.
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CENTERS (Optional)
TCRWP 2016
Bend Two: Fantasy Book Clubs
Anchor Text: More Excerpts or “The Dragon’s Tooth, by Bruce Colville” or “The Third Wish, by Joan Aiken
Session/Minilesson
Conferring and Small Group
1
Read Aloud of a story
Powerful fantasy readers learn to think metaphorically and
symbolically about fantasy. Characters face dragons- not just
literal dragons, but also metaphoric dragons, which are the
conflicts inside characters’ souls that haunt them.
Mid-Workshop Teaching
Clubs discuss the metaphors they
are noticing in their books by
asking these questions:
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3
4
In fantasy, the plot is the
vehicle for teaching about
ideas. Insightful readers
consider how the author
develops themes across a
narrative, including by
connecting scenes.
Often, in fantasy novels, a
dominant theme emerges of
a struggle between good
and evil. Knowledgeable
readers often analyze how
that theme plays out in
their particular novels.
Fantasy readers are alert to
the inner as well as the
outer struggles of
characters. They pay
attention, for example, to
the small details that
demonstrate a character’s
flaws.
*How do the different characters
respond to trouble?
*What lessons does the character seem
to learn? How?
*What lessons can we learn from how
the character responds?
*What do the characters’ struggles say
about the larger meanings?
Share
Students make a reading plan:
What will they be on the lookout
for during the next few days of
reading? What is the club “on”
about?
1. How to uncover a theme.
2. Tracking a theme through a text.
3. Comparing books with similar
themes.
How scenes along a similar theme
might connect:
* add info or ideas
Clubs discusses emerging themes
and ranks them.
1. What qualities or actions are
good in this story and which are
evil?
2. What lessons the character
learning?
3. What are we supposed to learn
about staying good or turning evil?
1. Inner struggles often live in the
choices a character makes.
2. Often the flaw is also the key to
the hero saving the world. Seeing
how that works in a book can help
to predict and learn.
Connect to power lesson in bend
one. Often good and evil both want
power – club asks – what is the
difference between good power
and bad power in this text?
Students make a reading plan:
What will they be on the lookout
for during the next few days of
reading? What is the club “on”
about?
Usually a character’s flaws are
connected to their strength.
Clubs discusses the hero’s main
flaws – how they are connected to
their strength, how their friends
and mentor help them, what they
are learning because of their
flaws.
* Make theme more urgent
* Show complexity
TCRWP 2016
5
6
7
Often the narrator’s point of
view influences how events
are described in a
novel. Experienced readers
analyze the narrator’s point
of view, including how it is
shown, and how it affects
the story.
In stories with multiple
plotlines the main
characters will have more
than one problem and
problems will arise for
other characters. Often
readers find it helpful to
use charts, timelines and
other graphic organizers to
track the problems that
arise in a story in order to
follow the multiple plot
lines.
1. Naming the pov of the story, and
what the narrator knows and does
not know.
2. Considering how much we can
trust the narrator.
3. Looking at how different
character feel about one scene.
Compare narrator’s point of view
with another character’s.
Club discusses how book would be
different if written from a
different character’s point of view:
what would the themes be then?
1. Helping students track various
plots with a chart.
2. Helping student who want to
track various problems and how
characters deal with them.
3. Helping students design their
own focus of complexity and the
tools to help them track it.
Choose a way to track your
thinking.
Set up your notes for
homework/the next few days’
work.
CENTERS (Optional)
TCRWP 2016