January Book of the Month, The Red Book

This perfectly eloquent wordless book tells the complex story of a reader who gets lost, literally, in a little book that has the magic to move her to another place. On her winter-gray walk to school, a young girl spies a book's red cover sticking out of a snowdrift and picks it up.

I chose The Red Book because Lehman's story captures the magical possibility that exists every time readers open a book–if they allow it: they can leave the "real world" behind and, like the heroine in this story, be transported by the helium of their imaginations.


INSTRUCTIONAL STRATEGIES:

PNWC Chart:
K-5 grade students can think through this wordless book by making Predictions, Noticings, Wonderings, and Connections about the story with teacher modeling during the minilesson. This incorporates a combination of reading strategies that students have learned and practiced with previous Books-of-the-Month and Readers Workshop Strategy Study to help students make sense of this text.

Response to Literature:
Using appropriate grade-level scaffolds, students will use the PNWC class chart to craft their own written response to The Red Book. Teachers should refer to the grade-level Response to Literature standard and student work samples to determine appropriate grade-level expectations for this written work. Teachers should refer to the grade-level Response to Literature standard and student work samples to determine appropriate grade-level expectations for this written work.