Thinking Deeply About Character in Second Grade

Students in second grade are delving deep into their thinking about character. While listening to the book Lola Levine is Not Mean by Angela Dominguez, our visiting author/illustrator,  students practice strategies that allow them to think deeply about the character. They are learning the difference between a character's feelings and a character's trait. 

In the book, Lola is a character who is usually excited to play soccer. In fact, she is a very competitive soccer player who is confident in her ability to be a great goalie. When she is accused of being too rough and mean to another child while playing soccer,  she feels embarrassed. Lola regains her confidence when she realizes she can write a note to this child and to her principal apologizing and also explaining her love of the sport. She is then able to show her friends her confidence and love of playing soccer and also her commitment to being a good friend. Second graders explored these issues during partner sharing and whole class conversations.

In small book groups students are having the opportunity to read and discuss Frog and Toad are Friends and Mouse and Mole Fine Feathered Friends. When finished with those two books they then can read from additional titles in our class collection. Discussion and writing have focused here too on understanding the character and choosing character traits that they can then share an example from the book that supports this trait.Second graders also bring this deep thinking about characters into the reading of their own independent reading as they write reflections about the characters in their books.