Marielle Slagel
3rd Grade Reading Lesson
10/24/12
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CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.3.2 Recount stories, including fables, folktales, and
myths from diverse cultures; determine the central message, lesson, or moral and
explain how it is conveyed through key details in the text.
At the end of this lesson, the students should be able to determine the different elements
that are in a fable, folktale, myth, and fairytale and be able to distinguish among them.
Students should also be able to create their own story using one of these formats.
Anticipatory Set: Students begin by making a list of fairy tales and fables they
know, and then brainstorm characteristics that describe those fables. The come up
with a complete list of what they know about fables before reading beginning to
read them. Using the think/pair/share technique, the students tell each other what
they have written down and share their ideas. This is the demonstration portion of
Routman’s Optimal Learning Model.
Lesson: The students all come together in the reading corner and listen as the
teacher reads Aesop’s Fables. The reason for choosing this book is because it
incorporates a lot of short fables with clear morals at the end. It is also beautifully
illustrated, humorous, and easy for students to relate to. The book introduces
concepts, background knowledge, as well as vocabulary that is appropriate for the
third grade level (Corpus and Giddings 41). The book also establishes inspiration
for a book binge so the students can continue finding fables similar to it (Corpus
and Giddings 42). The teacher uses the prediction technique and has the students
share their knowledge of fairy tales and fables to make predictions during the
read-aloud. The teacher then tells the students about other types of stories like
fables including fairy tales, myths, and folktales, and makes a chart about how
these types of stories differ or are similar to fables.
Next, students work together in small groups to read, discuss, and analyze fables,
folktales, fairy tales, and myths the teacher has provided. Students will have a
choice of which books they choose from a shelf of these types of books. Students
will then compile their own list of common elements from these stories in small
groups. After compiling a list of common elements, students free write to create
their own fairy tale, fable, folktale, or myth. This is the Independent Practice
because students are working individually to create their own story.
Assessment: Finally, each student presents his or her story with a partner. The
partners assess each other and write what type of story their partner used and if
they included all the requirements and necessary elements for that type story.
This technique encourages peer review and allows the teacher to assess if the
students grasped the concept based on what they learned from each other.
The effectiveness of my lesson will be clear through the stories that the students
create and write as well as their partner’s evaluations. The students will turn in a
hard copy of the stories as well as the evaluations so it will be obvious when the
teacher looks back on the stories if the students grasped the concept or not.
Differentiation:
I will differentiate my process according to my students learning interests.
Size:
 Giving student only one specific book to work with that is very similar to
the original read aloud
Time:
 More time to create their own story
Level of Support:
 In a peer group when writing story and analyzing story types. – Have
mentors who understand the concept better
 Extra help in when creating story from teacher
 Option of reading story to a single partner or read each other’s story
Input:
 Model story types and teacher writes his/her own story example
 Create a “Classifying Stories” visual chart for visual learners
Difficulty:
 Have student write a paragraph instead of an entire story
Output:
 Have students tell a story verbally instead of writing it down
Participation:
 Have student read classmates stories silently to themselves instead of
writing their own
Strengths
I have not used this lesson on children, but if I did, I assume the strengths would
be reading Aesop’s Fables as well as giving the students a choice in the book
that they want to analyze following the story.
Improvements
I could improve this lesson by narrowing down the amount of choices and
focusing on one specific genre such as fairy tales.
Differentiation for General Ed
To differentiate this lesson, I could give students only one genre to focus on. I
could also talk about the opening sentence of a story and compare them with
books from the same genre to show how important an opening sentence is to
grasp a reader’s attention. From there, I could have the students write a few
opening sentences from a certain genre instead of an entire story.
Adaptation for a Specific Disability
For a student with ADHD, this lesson would work because there is a read aloud
at the beginning that is very engaging. I could have this student come up and
hold the book or turn the pages to keep him or her interested in the lesson.
I have not used this lesson with students yet, but I think it would be very
beneficial to do in the future. Students typically really enjoy learning about books
in genres that are different than the ones they are used to seeing. I foresee the
students really enjoying writing their own stories using their writer’s voice as well.