Running head: READING LESSON IDEAS 1

Reading Lesson Ideas and the Western Australian Curriculum

Alice Dawson

University of Notre Dame, Fremantle

READING LESSON IDEAS
Western Australian Curriculum: English
Year Level: 3
Text: The Fabulous Friend Machine by Nick Bland
Literature
Sub-strand: Responding to Literature
(ACELT1596)
“Draw connections between personal
experiences and the worlds of texts,
and share responses with others.”
General Capabilities:
 Critical & creative thinking
 Personal & social capability
 Literacy
2
Activites
Asking Questions (Miller, 2002.
p.123).
Students explore ideas from the text
and relate these ideas to their own
personal experiences by answering
questions from the teacher. (Teacher
has sticky notes throughout the book,
and students are asked to share their
ideas with the person next to them, or
to the whole class).
Questions include:
 Who here has a mobile phone
at home?
 Has anyone ever been to a
farm? If so, what did you do
there?
 Tell the person next to you
about why you think mobile
phones can damage
friendships?
The Before-and-After Chart
(Department of Education, 2003.
p.137).
This activity is designed to see what
students know before they start a text,
and what they know afterwards.
Students are supported to make
connections to what they know before
starting the topic. Students construct a
two-tabled chart. The first section is
their prior knowledge on the dangers
of social media, and the second is
what they learnt from the story and a
reflection. Students are able to
brainstorm ideas while the story is
read to them. Students are allowed to
READING LESSON IDEAS
Literacy
Sub-strand: Interacting with others
(ACELY1676)
“Listen to and contribute to
conversations and discussions to
share information and ideas and
negotiate in collaborative situations”
General Capabilities:
 Literacy
 Critical & creative thinking
 Personal & social capability
3
add in any questions or curiosities
that were sparked from reading the
text.
Students share their chart with a small
group of peers to collaborate and
share ideas.
Activities
Taking the Conversation Deeper
(Miller, 2002. p.93).
After reading the text, students play a
game called “Beach Ball” which
involves listening to conversations
and sharing ideas. This ball has
sections written on it including
“Beginning,” “Favourite Part,”
“Favourite Character,” and “Moral of
the story.” Students stand behind their
desks and throw the ball to their
peers. Students have to answer the
section they land on, sharing their
ideas with the rest of the class.
(Fuchs, Fuchs, & Kazdan, 1999)
KWL Chart (Miller, 2002. p.93).
Students share their ideas by creating
a KWL chart after reading the text.
K= what students already knew, W=
what they’d like to know and L= what
they’ve learned. This chart is in
relation to the moral of the story,
which is that social media can be
dangerous if not used cautiously and
responsibly. Students then present
these charts to another group of
students. After all students have
presented, students are to discuss the
“W” section, to see if any students
thought similar, or if anyone can
answer their question. (Fuchs, Fuchs,
& Kazdan, 1999)
READING LESSON IDEAS
Language
Sub-strand: Expressing and
developing ideas
(ACELA1482)
“Understand that verbs represent
different processes, for
example doing, thinking, saying, and
relating and that these processes are
anchored in time through tense”
General Capabilities:
 Literacy
 Critical & creative thinking
 ICT capability
 Personal & social capability
4
Activities
Anchor Lesson (Miller, 2002.
p.107).
As the teacher reads the text, teacher
writes on the board the verbs they
come across. (Students have
previously learned about verbs in year
one). Students then create a poster
(using the verbs from the text),
categorising these verbs into different
sections. These sections include:
 Doing words (ie run, threw,
chopped)
 Thinking words (ie decided,
imagined, realised)
After students construct these posters,
students share them with a partner.
Teacher displays these posters around
the class in a convenient place, so
students can refer back to them.
Verb Charades
After reading the text, students are
placed into small groups. Each
student gets given a verb to act out to
their group. Students have to guess
which verb they got from the story.
Students also have to say which
category the verb fits into and why.
These categories include:
 Doing
 Thinking
 Saying
 Relating
To extend this activity, students can
film themselves using iMovie. These
iMovie’s can them be shared with the
rest of the class.
READING LESSON IDEAS
Literature
Sub-strand: Examining literature
(ACELT1599)
“Discuss how language is used to
describe the settings in texts, and
explore how the settings shape the
events and influence the mood of the
narrative”
General Capabilities:
 Literacy
 Critical & creative thinking
 Intercultural understanding
 ICT capability
Cross-Curriculum Priorities
 Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islander histories and cultures
5
Activities
Descriptive Drawings
Students are to draw their favourite
scene from the text. Students are to
write key words from the scene. For
example, if they draw Fiddlesticks
Farm, they would write words around
the drawing such as “grassy
paddocks,” and “smelly cows.”
Students then present their drawing to
a partner. Students should include the
mood of their drawing, and why.
To make this activity more
interactive, students can upload their
drawings into Book Creator and type
their words around the images. This
Book Creator can then be shared with
the teacher, group and the rest of the
class.
Exploring a different culture
After reading the text and doing the
drawings from the “descriptive
drawings” activity, students look at
some examples of local Aboriginal
art. Students are then to re-draw their
favourite scene from The Fabulous
Friend Machine, but in the style of
Aboriginal art.
Students are then to explore an
Aboriginal story book about the
Dreamtime and compare the two
texts. Students discuss how the
language is used in each text to shape
the mood of the narrative.
These posters will then be hung up
around the room to display the two
types of art pieces from two different
texts.
READING LESSON IDEAS
Literacy
Sub-strand: Texts in context
(ACELY1675)
“Identify the point of view in a text
and suggest alternative points of
view”
General Capabilities:
 Literacy
 Critical & creative thinking
 Personal & social capability
Language
Sub-strand: Expressing and
developing ideas
(ACELA1484)
“Learn extended and technical
vocabulary and ways of expressing
opinion including modal verbs and
adverbs”
General Capabilities:
 Literacy
 Personal & social capability
 Critical & creative thinking
 ICT capability
6
Activities
A New Point of View (Miller, 2002.
p.93).
After reading the text, students are to
re-write the story from the point of
view of another character (pig, horse,
wolf). Students then read their story
to a group of four students. Students
are then to talk about how the
different point of view changed the
story.
Changing the Ending, Keeping the
Moral
Students are to draw a picture of what
they think could have happened if
Popcorn’s friends had not come to
save her. Students are to draw the
picture in relation to their own point
of view and their own context to
share their ideas.
Students then share these pictures
with a partner. Students are to discuss
how even though they changed the
ending, the moral of the story stays
the same.
Activity
Creating Mental Images (Miller,
2002. p.73).
Teacher creates two piles of notecards
for each group of students. Students
are to pick up one card from each
pile. One pile has verbs and the other
has adverbs from the text. Students
have to act out their two words to
their group. For example, they might
get the word “walk” and “slowly.”
Students have to guess what two
cards they got.
READING LESSON IDEAS 7

Teacher goes on to remind students

that a verb is a doing word and an
adverb is a describing word (Fuchs,
Fuchs, & Kazdan, 1999).

To extend this activity, students can

film their group acting out their
words. Students can then upload these
to iMovie to share with the rest of the
class.

Literacy Activity
Sub-strand: Interpreting, analysing The purpose of texts (Fuchs, Fuchs,
and evaluating & Kazdan, 1999).
(ACELY1678) After reading the text, students are to
“Identify the audience and purpose of get into groups of three or four.
imaginative, informative and In these groups, students are to create
persuasive texts” a Pic Collage using an iPad. This
needs to include three sections.
General Capabilities: 1. The targeted audience of The
 Literacy Fabulous Friend Machine and
 ICT capability why
 Personal & social capability 2. The purpose of The Fabulous
 Critical & creative thinking Friend Machine. Why was it
written?
3. Photocopied section of the
book which highlights their
favourite scene from the story.

Students should also include what

they liked about the story and if it
changed their perspective on mobile
phones.
READING LESSON IDEAS 8

References

Department of Education. (2003). First steps reading resource book. Retrieved from

http://det.wa.edu.au/stepsresources/detcms/navigation/first-steps-literacy/

Fuchs, L. S., Fuchs, D., & Kazdan, S. (1999). Effects of peer-assisted learning strategies on

high school students with serious reading problems. Remedial and Special Education,

20(5), 309-318.

Miller, D. (2002). Reading with meaning: Teaching comprehension in the primary grades.

Stenhouse Publishers. p73-123.