Comparing Characters
Your young students will compare how two characters have changed in a story.
A Character’s Challenges and Changes
Your 1st and 2nd graders will analyze how a character responded to a challenge.
Characters’ Faults Can Also Be Strengths
Strength and weakness are often two sides of the same coin. Students will explore how a character’s flaw can be a benefit.
Comparing Characters’ Bedrooms
What item’s in a character’s bedroom would reflect their deepest desires? And what if they toured a similar character’s room?
A Character’s Playlist
What playlist of songs best goes with a character’s change over time?
Analyze Characters Using Philosophy
What is the Brick Pig’s philosophy? How would he apply it to the characters in Harry Potter?
Characters Dressed as Other Characters for Halloween
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?
Virtue or Vice?
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.
Not Like The Others: Charlotte’s Web
Four Charlotte’s Web characters. One doesn’t belong. But which one? That depends on your argument.
Do Narrators Have Too Much Power?
Imagine being a character in a story. Are you worried that your story’s narrator may inaccurately describe you? What if they reveal something you wanted to be kept secret? Do narrators have too much power!?
The Personalities of Rocks
What would an igneous rock be like? Would it get along with a sedimentary rock? Could they handle the hot personality of a metamorphic rock?
More Specific than “Smart”
When students are told that they’re “smart”, what does this word actually mean to them? (Psst. It isn’t what we intended.)
Analyze Character Change with Depth and Complexity
Your students will use Depth and Complexity to note how a character’s main trait changes across a story.
Introduce Symbolism with Pixel Art
Create a pixelated icon that represents the essence of a character!
Characters’ Talents and Multiple Intelligences
How do characters from novels line up with Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences?
Literary Technique: Juxtaposition
Put a grumpy character next to a joyful one and they make each other stand out even more. Opposites are powerful!
Motivation and Moral Development
Can someone do the right thing, but for the wrong reason?
Romeo and Juliet Summary
Romeo and Juliet in just about five minutes.
“Much Ado About Nothing” Summary
Shakespeare’s Much Ado summarized in just five minutes!
Twelfth Night Summary
An animated summary of Shakespeare’s utterly ridiculous “Twelfth Night.”
Hamlet Summary
It’s Hamlet in just about five minutes!
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Nothing could possibly go wrong with a love potion on the loose!
Better Stories Part 5: Plot Structure
Ever read a student’s story that was just event after event after event and then a very sudden ending? They lack an understanding of a plot’s structure. With the help of Finding Nemo, I break down how to set up a well-structured plot.
Better Stories Part 2: Types of Conflict
If your students’ stories are packed with endless ninja fights or arguments between frenemies, it’s time to expose them to a wider range of conflicts.
Better Stories Part 3: Literary Themes
A typical student narrative includes plot and characters but lacks a larger idea to hold it all together. This is where a lesson on themes comes in…
Better Stories Part 4: Character Archetypes
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.