Teaching Theme

Theme is a {HUGE} 5th grade standard! Not only in fiction texts, but students have to identify theme in poetry and dramas. Theme is always a tricky standard to teach... especially for struggling students.

First, I started off with this anchor chart. Message isn't really a 5th grade standard, but they will be talking about it in 6th grade. I wanted to give them (especially my advanced and gifted students) a preview that although they are similar, theme and message are NOT the same.

To get things moving along a bit, we read Rumpelstiltskin and talked about the theme of the book.

To help them understand, we used this graphic organizer that I made for them. You can download it by clicking on the image. This was SUCH a useful tool for the students and really got them thinking deeply about theme. This graphic organizer matches up nicely with standard RL.5.2!

Then, we watched this Rumpelstiltskin video that you can find on youtube HERE.

After we watched the video, we compared the two. There were actually quite a bit of differences and similarities between the two! I created this graphic organizer just for this activity. You can download it by clicking the image below :)

I knew I would spend quite a bit of time teaching theme this year, so earlier in the year, I decided to create a little something to help me along :)

When it came time for my students to practice theme and constructed responses, I used my Close Reading Literary Passages for Teaching Theme.

You can find them in my TpT store {HERE}.  The passages are specifically written with a theme in mind. I love this packet because you can choose whether or not to include message with your instruction {the passages ARE NOT exclusively for message}.

I had the students read the passage and then fill out the challenge+response=theme graphic organizer. Once students identified theme and supported their theme with evidence from the text, I had them construct a response about the theme of the passage. I use my I.C.E. format. You can learn a little more about it below as well as download a FREEBIE:) There will be more about this when I {NEVER} finish my TBE packet.

Here are some pictures of students working and constructing their responses. Let me tell you that this was after MANY classes of small group instruction :)

What are some of your favorite theme activities?