We’re working our way through our launching reading workshop unit and my third graders are having a lot of trouble identifying the different genres. I have posters in the room and they have a reference sheet in their reader’s notebooks, but it’s still difficult for them.
I like to play educational games in class so I made up Genre Twist a few years ago when my students were having trouble remembering the different genres. I
pick a genre and start telling a story. After a few sentences, I pass
the story to my neighbor and she has to pick up where I left off. I say
“Switch” every few sentences and assign a new genre. The next student
has to continue the SAME story, but pick it up in a different genre. Our
stories are always really fun as princesses, aliens, and talking
animals end up riding in covered wagons. =) Unfortunately, this year’s group of students doesn’t yet have a solid enough understanding of the genres to play.
pick a genre and start telling a story. After a few sentences, I pass
the story to my neighbor and she has to pick up where I left off. I say
“Switch” every few sentences and assign a new genre. The next student
has to continue the SAME story, but pick it up in a different genre. Our
stories are always really fun as princesses, aliens, and talking
animals end up riding in covered wagons. =) Unfortunately, this year’s group of students doesn’t yet have a solid enough understanding of the genres to play.
We’ve been wrapping up reading workshop by sharing our independent books and attempting to sort them by genres, but that’s still not doing the job. I tried highlighting a genre of the day… nope! still not enough. *Finally* a set of game cards seems to be doing the trick.
I whipped them up on the fly in class, so ours are hand-written. I like this because the students actually have to copy the work themselves, but it did take a bit of time (two different minilessons). I started with eight basic genres, but plan to slowly introduce more. We folded two sheets of computer paper into eighths and wrote the genre on one card and its definition on another. Then we cut them out and tried to play a matching game (like memory) with them. We used our posters and notebook reference sheet to check our answers. I still found that my students were making incorrect matches though (and not realizing it!). So we went back and added little pictures to each set (like a magic wand for fantasy or a magnifying glass for general nonfiction). Don’t judge my sketches, but here’s mine.
My students are really starting to make progress with the genres now, which makes our classroom discussions and minilessons so much better. I decided to make a typed set for my centers though because the students are having trouble reading each others’ cards when they play partner games (memory, go fish).
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I uploaded them to my TpT store. If you like them, please take a second to leave positive feedback. I appreciate it!
Thanks for hopping through on the Back to School Blog Hunt. Be sure to check out all the other great posts. Jana at Thinking Out Loud is up tomorrow!
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Christi, I love your genre matching cards! Thanks so much for sharing them. I teach primary, but, I shared the link to your store with my intermediate friends. Thanks, again!
Ѽ Lori
Teaching With Love and Laughter
luvyorkies@gmail.com
That was so nice, thanks!
Thank you so much for the genre matching cards. :)Tammi
Those genre matching cards are a great idea! I'll be creating some soon, I'm sure! Thank you 🙂
Erin
http://adventuresinthirdgrade-brown.blogspot.com/
I saw your genre cards on Pinterest. I am the author of a book called Joe Bright And The Seven Genre Dudes. I think it might be a helpful tool to add to your unit. I hope you will check it out.
You should try to get a preview up on Amazon! I'm not sure how it works, but I couldn't really check it out to see how it would work for my grade.
Did you find it on Amazon? If not, you can find out more about it on Highsmith.com. Also you can go to my website at http://www.jackiemimshopkins.com. It is a good springboard book for teaching genres for third, fourth and fifth graders.
Thanks for linking up today at TBA!
~Fern
Fern Smith's Classroom Ideas!
Great ideas for introducing/teaching/reinforcing genres. That is something my kids struggle with too. I love the matching game and have downloaded a copy. Thank you for sharing!
Amanda
The Teaching Thief
Love these! Thank you!