I just spent the past two hours working getting reading for this week’s P4 Reading classes. We’ll be covering Chapter 19 – “The Egg Sac” – and Chapter 20 – “The Hour of Triumph.” Because the length of our lessons have just been reduced from 50 to 40 minutes each, I have to fix the amount of material I can cover in that all-too-brief time.
It really is different for each class as how much I can teach in P4/Yellow or Red isn’t the same as what I can do in P4/Star or Green. There is quite a bit of vocabulary in these two chapters; I picked out twenty-one words that I’d like to cover just from Chapter 21! There are a total of nineteen questions that I could ask for to see if the students truly understand this important part of the book. After all, Charlotte has created her egg sac (her magnum opus, or “great work”) while she is feeling very tired all the time and can now rest knowing she has truly saved Wilbur’s life with his winning of the “special award.” There is a lot happening in the book as we are nearing it’s end (we’ll finish it in another week).
After some great thought, I’ve decided that the children will get the most meaning out of these chapters if I simply read them aloud in the classes. If they have already attempted to read the chapters at home, they will benefit greatly by following along in their books while I read it to them. I’ll introduce a bit of vocabulary at the beginning and stop to explain other words as we meet them in the text. I do so enjoy reading to the kids and there is so little time in P4 to be able to do that. The beginning of Chapter 19 in particular is beautifully written and conveys some nice imagery and feelings that are best shared through a proper oral read-through as I can express the emotions through changes in my voice. I’m looking forward to it, and I’m sure the students will appreciate the break from the summary/Q&A routine we’ve followed recently. It’s always good to change things from time to time in order to breathe new life into a subject…
