ANANSI THE SPIDER activities and lesson plan ideas

This ANANSI THE SPIDER Activities and Interactive Read Aloud Resource Book Companion Packet includes lesson plans, reading comprehension questions, vocabulary, grammar, phonics, writing and word study activities with both printable and digital student pages.

Following an interactive read aloud of the picture book, ANANSI THE SPIDER by Gerald McDermott, choose from the included collection of either printable activities or go paperless and use the digital activities to practice standards-based skills. We've even included editable teaching slides themed to match the book!

THIS READING UNIT FOCUSES ON USING THE MENTOR TEXT TO TEACH:

◼️READING STRATEGIES

☐ ANALYZING SETTING

☐ MAKING PREDICTIONS

☐ SUMMARIZING

◼️GRAMMAR & LANGUAGE CONCEPTS

☐ COMMON AND PROPER NOUNS

☐ ADJECTIVES

☐ QUOTATION MARKS

◼️SOCIAL EMOTIONAL LEARNING TOPICS

☐ CONFLICT RESOLUTION

☐ TEAMWORK

SUMMARY OF THE MENTOR TEXT:

Anansi the Spider is a West African folktale that takes place in Ghana. It tells the story of Anansi the spider and his six sons who each have a different skill. One day, Anansi wanders too far from home and runs into trouble.

Anansi’s sons sense the trouble and use their skills to save Anansi. They work together as a team and each use their special skill set.

That night, Anansi finds a mysterious and beautiful globe and decides he will give it to the son who saved him. Until him and his sons decide who that is, he gives the globe to Nyame, the god of everything, to hold on to.

Anansi and his sons cannot stop arguing over who the globe should go to. Nyame takes the globe and puts it into the sky to stay forever, creating the moon.

THIS COLLECTION OF ACTIVITIES and LESSON IDEAS INCLUDES:

➜ Comprehension Questions categorized by reading strategy; text-dependent
➜ Social Emotional Learning guidance lesson ideas & discussion topics based on the story
➜ Vocabulary Activities with kid-friendly definitions
➜ Grammar Topics selected to align with the text
➜ Focus Sentences use the book & author's craft as a mentor text to improve writing
➜ Lesson Planner summary, background info and planning space

➜ Story Mapping Printable identify character, setting, problem and solution

➜ Making Words Activity Page use any word from the book

➜ Focus Sentence copy work, identifying elements of the sentence, rewriting)

➜ Design a New Book Cover demonstrate understanding of the text by creating an illustration

➜ Predicting Activity primary-ruled and wider-ruled versions
➜ Summarizing Somebody → Wanted → But → Then → Finally

➜ Comparing and Contrasting using a Venn Diagram

➜ Cause and Effect analyze how events affect one another

➜ Visualization illustrate visualizations from the story and support thinking with text-based evidence

➜ Making Connections identify text-to-self, text-to-text, and text-to-world connections

➜ Thematic Writing Paper Use with the Writing Prompts... Makes a Great Bulletin Board

➜ 2 Sequencing Activities First → Next → Then → Last and Beginning → Middle → End

➜ 2 Vocabulary Activities Vocabulary Booklet and Word Mapping

➜ 2 Character Trait Activities listing traits and supporting traits with text-based evidence
➜ 30 Text-Based Writing Prompts 3 prompts for each of the following types of writing:

• narrative
• persuasive / opinion
• descriptive
• expository / informative
• creative / story writing
• procedure / how-to
• list making
• letter / postcard writing
• poem
• book reviews

INCLUDED DIGITAL ACTIVITIES:

➜ 5 Teaching Slides to use for instruction (add questions, vocabulary, instructions, etc)

➜ 15 Student Pages for use in Google™️ Classroom or as editable files to create customized printables