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We tell students to ‘show, not tell’ — but that advice is useless until they experience the difference. This lesson makes it click.
Your 1st and 2nd graders will analyze how a character responded to a challenge.
Put a grumpy character next to a joyful one and they make each other stand out even more. Opposites are powerful!
A character can act one way at the beginning of a story and surprise you by the end. Students gather the clues and name the change.
The trait that makes a hero heroic is the same trait that makes a villain villainous. There’s just too much of it, or too little.
Create a pixelated icon that represents the essence of a character!
What item’s in a character’s bedroom would reflect their deepest desires? And what if they toured a similar character’s room?
Can someone do the right thing, but for the wrong reason?
Four Charlotte’s Web characters. One doesn’t belong. But which one? That depends on your argument.
What if one character dressed up as another for Halloween? Would the Cat in the Hat pick Captain Jack Sparrow, because they’re both chaotic yet good-natured people? Would Elsa dress up as The Ice King since they are both lonely?
What is the Brick Pig’s philosophy? How would he apply it to the characters in Harry Potter?
What playlist of songs best goes with a character’s change over time?
Anyone can say a character changed. Your students will prove it: four details from the beginning, four from the end, and the two traits those details point to.
Strength and weakness are often two sides of the same coin. Students will explore how a character’s flaw can be a benefit.
Aristotle noted that positive traits and negative traits are often the same thing, but just in different amounts. The right amount is a virtue, but too much or too little and it’s a vice.
Are students’ characters a bit flat? Archetypes give them a strong foundation on which to build their own characters as well as a tool to analyze existing stories.
Your young students will compare how two characters have changed in a story.
