Lesson 3*

Lesson Topic: Sometimes characters can change in a story Grade level: 2 nd Length of lesson: 45 mins

Desired Results
State Content Standard(s):
 2.RL.2.3 Describe how characters in a story respond to major events and challenges.
Central Focus: Essential Question(s):
Students will develop comprehension skills by  Why does a character change?
analyzing events in a story that demonstrate how  How do you know a character has changed?
characters can change.  What do you think contributed to the character’s
change?
The focus for this lesson is for students to understand
that characters can change from the beginning to the end
of the story after making a mistake and learning a lesson.
Student objectives (outcomes):
Students will be able to:
 Understand that characters can change in a story after making a mistake and learning a lesson.

Assessment Evidence
Performance Task(s): Other Evidence:
 Students will assist the teacher in completing a The teacher will assess student learning through:
chart as a class that outlines how the characters  Turn and talk partner discussions
from Listen Buddy, All for Me and None for All,  Verbal answers to guiding questions
and Princess Penelope’s Parrot changed after before/during/after reading
making a mistake and learning a lesson. Verbal contributions for the chart
 Students will complete the character change quiz.
Learning Plan
Learning Activities:
Before reading:
 The students will gather on their carpet spots to participate in an interactive read aloud of the book, Princess
Penelope’s Parrot.
 The teacher will introduce the students to the text by displaying the front cover of the book and asking, “What do
you notice about the illustration on the front cover?” Guide students to see infer that the parrot is a birthday
present for Penelope.
 The teacher will then say, “Some parrots are able to repeat what humans say and can even learn to talk
themselves! Let’s read to find out Princess Penelope’s parrot learns to say.”
During reading:
 After page 7, ask the students, “What are you thinking about Penelope?” If the students are unable to come to the
conclusion that she is spoiled, guide them by saying things such as, “She seems to be very bossy and gets
whatever she wants.”
 After page 11, ask the students, “Is Penelope being kind to her new parrot?”
 After page 20, ask the students, “I want you to make a prediction, what do you think will happen when the prince
arrives? Turn and tell your partner.”
 After page 24, ask the students, “Who does the prince think is talking?” “He thought it was Penelope talking
instead of the parrot didn’t he?”
After reading:
 The teacher will tell the students, “This week we have been discussion how characters can learn a lesson after
making a mistake. Does this apply to Penelope? Lets’ break it down. What was her mistake? Did she learn a
lesson? If so, what was the lesson she learned?” Invite the students to share their ideas with their partner.
  While the students are discussing, the teacher will reveal the pre-made chart paper with four columns labeled,
Title, Character, Mistake, Change. For this chart students will only be working on filling the elements in for,
Princess Penelope’s Parrot.
 When students are sharing out their ideas they should come to the conclusion that Penelope’s mistake was that
she was spoiled and unkind. The lesson she learned was to be grateful for what she has, and to always chose to be
kind. If students are unable to get there ask the following guiding questions: “Does Penelope behave in a
respectful manner?” “Why did the prince leave Penelope?” “How would the story have ended differently if
Penelope had spoken kindly to the parrot?”
 The teacher will then explicitly note that when characters in a story make a mistake and learn a lesson, they can
change from who they were at the beginning of the story. The teacher will then ask, “how did Penelope change
after making her mistake and learning a lesson?”
 For the students who respond, the teacher will ask “Why do you think that?” As the students are contributing
their ideas, the teacher will fill in the chart with, their ideas for Penelope’s change and the reasons why. It should
be geared towards: “Penelope learns to be kind and grateful” in the change column, and “Because she was
spoiled, unkind, and rude to the parrot which scared the prince away.”
 When Penelope’s columns are completed the class will work together to complete the chart for the other two
books that were read previously. The teacher will ask the students to turn and talk with their partner about how
Buddy and Gruntly changed and why.
 To end the lesson, explicitly explain to the students, “Today we learned that characters in a story can change after
they learn a lesson from mistake. We learned from Penelope the importance of being grateful and kind.”
 The teacher will then fill in the objective for the lesson at the top of the chart paper, “Sometimes characters can
change in a story because of things that happen to them.”
Assessment:
 The teacher will instruct the students to go back to their desks to take an independent character change quiz.
 Students will be handed a quiz and the teacher will give direction: This quiz asks the students to identify what the
mistake was that the character made, the lesson they learned and how they changed. The students will be given a
choice of which story to complete their quiz on, Listen Buddy or All for Me and None for All.
 Students will be given until the end of the day to complete their quiz.

Resources and Materials:

 Princess Penelope’s Parrot
 “Sometimes characters can change” chart
 Different colored markers
 25 copies of the character change quiz
Required Accommodations/Modifications:
For the students with IEP’s:
Student with Autism:
 Frequent turn and talks so the student can practice speech once before it is shared with the class.
 When the student raises their hand, the teacher will give verbal prompting cues such as, giving a sentence starter,
or restating the question.
 The student is seated in the second row of the assigned carpet seats so he can hear and see the read alouds
clearly.
 For the quiz, the student will be brought to the back table to have the quiz questions read aloud. If needed, this
student is permitted to say the answers out loud and the teacher will record the answers on the quiz.
Student with Emotional Disorder:
 During turn and talks the student prefers to come and talk to the teacher instead of talking to a peer, if they
decide to participate at all.
 If the student has something to contribute to the class chart their aid will write it down and share it with the
teacher.
 This student will take their quiz to the special education teacher and complete it there.
For the ELL students:
 These students are seated next to a native English speaker, so during turn and talks they will have a chance to
practice their speech before sharing with the whole class.
 When the student raises their hand, the teacher will give verbal prompting cues such as, giving a sentence starter,
or restating the question.
  While reading aloud, the teacher will point at the illustrations while reading to make it explicit that the text is
referring to the pictures.
 For the quiz, these students will be brought to the back table to have the quiz questions read aloud. If needed,
these students are permitted to say the answers out loud and the teacher will record the answers on the quiz.
Additional Modifications for Individual Students:
For students who need a greater challenge:
 To provide a greater challenge for students who may show that they have completed the learning objective, they
will be asked to take out their readers notebooks during their independent reading/writing time. Within their
readers notebook, they will complete an entry describing a situation that they have changed after making a
mistake and learning a lesson, like Buddy, Gruntly, and/or Penelope.
For students who need extra support:
 Struggling readers are seated next to high readers on the carpet in order to help the struggling reader to
comprehend the story while discussing it.
 Struggling readers are seated near the front so the teacher is easily able to listen in/confer with them during the
turn and talks in case they need extra guidance.
 The teacher will provide adequate wait time after asking questions that aren’t followed with a turn and talk.
 The teacher will read the quiz questions aloud to the students if they raise their hands for assistance.
 The quiz has built in sentence stems to assist the students who need help starting their sentences.

Extending the Lesson

To continue the learning from this lesson, during independent reading time, have students can seek out other fiction
books from the classroom library where a character makes a mistake and learns a lesson. Ask students to complete an
entry in their readers notebook outlining what mistake was made, if the mistake helped the character learn a lesson and if
the character changed. Students may write about a time where they have changed after making a mistake and learned a
lesson to help make a connection between the text and themselves.
OR
Students may go back to their journal entries from the previous days (if applicable) and add on to their entry outlining
how the character changed since the students already outlined the mistake and the lesson learned.
*This lesson is adapted from the required Fountas and Pinnell Literacy Curriculum. It has elements of both the Interactive
Read Aloud guide as well as the Reading Mini Lesson Principle guide.

Adapted from Understanding by Design, Expanded 2nd Edition (2005) by Grant Wiggins and Jay McTighe, Association for
Supervision and Curriculum Development.