ELF activities and lesson plan ideas

This ELF 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, ELF by David Berenbaum, 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 CHARACTER

☐ CAUSE AND EFFECT

☐ ANALYZING SETTING

☐ MAKING CONNECTIONS

☐ SUMMARIZING / RETELLING

◼️GRAMMAR & LANGUAGE CONCEPTS

☐ ARTICLES

☐ POSSESSIVE NOUNS

☐ PRONOUNS

☐ ADVERBS

◼️SOCIAL EMOTIONAL LEARNING TOPICS

☐ COURAGE

☐ INDIVIDUALITY

SUMMARY OF THE MENTOR TEXT:

Kim Smith has turned the popular Christmas movie, Elf, into a beautifully illustrated picture book. Students will enjoy listening to this retelling of their favorite movie.

When a baby made his way back to the North Pole in Santa’s sack one Christmas Eve, an older elf decided to adopt the baby and name him Buddy. While Buddy grew faster than all the other children, he had more Christmas spirit than anyone. However, when Buddy was older, he learned that his real father, Walter was on the naughty list.

Buddy was determined to go to New York City to meet his father. He made the long journey into the city where life was very different. When Buddy finally met his father, he came to understand why he was on the naughty list. Walter was a grumpy man who prioritized work over his family. He did not take much of an interest in Buddy.

Buddy was able to find Christmas spirit in the city thanks to Jovie, a girl who worked at a department store. Buddy came to really like Jovie as they shared a love for Christmas. When Buddy tries to tell his father this during an important meeting, Walter yelled at Buddy. This caused Buddy to run away. However, on his way out of the city, Buddy ran into Santa. His sleigh couldn’t fly because there was not enough Christmas spirit. Meanwhile, Buddy’s father Walter and his son Michael were out searching for Buddy. They were able to lift Christmas spirit by singing carols outside the park, and Santa’s sleigh was able to fly.

Walter learned the importance of family and Buddy was able to spend Christmas doing all of his favorite things with those he loved most.

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