Mentor Text - Inference, Character Traits, and Predictions

I am linking up with Collaboration Cuties today to share a mentor text for Language Arts.

I do love this linky because I am able to find new books to bring my lessons to life.

Today I am sharing Tomás and The Library Lady written by Pat Mora.

 

Here is the book description taken from about.com:

Tomás travels with his family of migrant workers from their winter home in Texas to Iowa for a summer of work picking fruits and vegetables. Tomás loves the stories his grandfather Papá Grande tells. His grandfather encourages him to go to the library for more stories, and with excitement and apprehension, Tomás does so.

Before he even gathers the courage to enter the library, the librarian approaches him and invites him in for a drink of water. He spends the day at the library but is transported to other times and places as he reads some of the books. At the end of the day, the librarian checks out two books on her card for Tomás to take with him. Tomás eagerly shares the stories with his family and continues to visit the library whenever he can. At summer's end when he visits the library with a farewell gift for the librarian, she has a gift for Tomás… a book of his own to take with him.

Throughout the read aloud I have the students turn and talk to make predictions, we make inferences for our anchor chart, and we discuss character traits for Tomás and the librarian.

After the read aloud I have students write postcards to the librarian from the perspective of Tomás.  They are to explain where he is and what he is doing.

I have also used this book as a spring board to begin discussing heroes.  We discuss what the characteristics of a hero are and who can be perceived as a hero from the book.  Then we discuss local heroes and students draw a picture of them and write a short description of them that include their traits and what they have done.

Don’t forget to stop by Collaboration Cuties and learn about other great mentor texts to use in your classroom.

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Until next time…