The Donkey Egg activities and lesson plan ideas

Our The Donkey Egg Activities are now digital for distance learning with editable teaching slides and worksheets based on Janet Stevens and Susan Crummel's book. Read aloud the picture book then use the printables or go paperless with Google or Seesaw to practice standards-based skills.

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

◼️ READING STRATEGIES

☐ making predictions

☐ analyzing character

☐ plot | problem - solution

☐ identifying genre

☐ rhyme | rhythm | repetition

◼️ SOCIAL EMOTIONAL LEARNING TOPICS

☐ best-effort

☐ kindness

◼️ GRAMMAR & LANGUAGE CONCEPTS

☐ interjections

☐ nouns

☐ capitalization

☐ adjectives

SUMMARY OF THE MENTOR TEXT:

Bear’s farm was a mess and in need of repair. He didn’t seem to mind though and spent his days sleeping on the porch until Fox stopped by. Fox convinced Bear to buy a watermelon, telling him it was a donkey egg that would hatch and help tend to the farm. Bear took his job of caring for the donkey egg seriously. He kept it warm, safe, and happy. His neighbor, Hare, was training for a race and was always surprised to see Bear out of his chair, taking care of the egg.

Bear spent weeks caring for his donkey egg until one day, he started to fall asleep. The donkey egg started to roll away, down the hill. Bear and Hare chased after it but were too late, it smashed on the ground and seeds went everywhere. Bear decided to plant the watermelon seeds and Hare helped. When the two friends sold all their watermelon, they were finally able to get a donkey.

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