Overview
I remember growing up we read lots of fairy tales and stories about imagination in school and at home. In school during reading groups we usually read books like Where the Wild things Are, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, and Dr. Seuss books. We had multiple recesses and played outside. We made up our own games and our own worlds, we created our own characters in these worlds and spent hours playing with our friends. School was all about the imagination and play in the primary grades. In fact, I don't remember even having a desk until about third grade. What happened? Why has all of the fun and imagination been replaced by nonfiction and organized play? Students never get a chance to be children or use their imagination! We expect them to sit in a chair and read a book, do math, or copy things off of the board at the beginning of first grade. Our recess and play time has gone from three recesses a day (one thirty minute recess after lunch and one fifteen minute recess in the morning and another one in the afternoon) to one ten to fifteen minute recess a day. We wonder why so many students do not like school or have behavior problems. I find myself wondering how much this has to do with the way we teach and the never ending demands and expectations we put on our students. I wouldn't like school either, there is very little fun or joy there.
I want my students to have fun in reading and writing and to do this we will be learning how to write comic books. The best person to help us achieve this is Scott McCloud. He is a cartoonist, best known for his book Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art, who really opens your eyes to using your imagination in the creation of comic books. This book explains everything we need to know about making comic books and graphic novels. We will be using everything we learn about making comic books to make our own stories and eventually a class comic book.
To learn about writing and how comic books are put together we will be reading graphic novels as a class using the read-aloud approach. Colleen Af Venable is the author Guinea Pig Private Eye series of graphic novels that are not only engaging but will help my students learn about how to take care of our classroom pet. This series along with the Mr. Badger and Mrs. Fox series written by Brigitte Lacianai and Eve Tharlet will be used throughout this unit. These books will help teach character education and how to take care of animals in a fun way by reading graphic novels to learn. We will then use what we have learned about comics to make our own comic books during independent writing time.
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