Teaching character development

Using picture books and social emotional topics, teachers can help students analyze character development as it relates to literary themes.

Yesterday we started discussing how an author develops a character through the character's thoughts, actions, and dialogue. As we read aloud Ch. 1 of Touching Spirit Bear, we looked for examples of thoughts, actions, and dialogue that revealed more about Cole. We sorted them on our chart. Afterwards, I had students categorize sentences I took from Ch. 1 of the text. On the left side, they labeled each sentence with either 'thought', 'action', or 'dialogue'. This helped them explicitly…

In this quick, free, no-prep lesson, we identify character traits and character conflicts to teach character development in an easy and engaging way!

Looking for creative ways to help your 3rd grade students understand character traits? This blog post shares fun activities that engage students in learning about characters as individuals and comparing them to others. From creating anchor charts to practicing character traits through reading, writing, and role-playing, these activities will help students better understand who characters are and what motivates their actions.

Check out these teaching ideas including printable activities including an animated short to use with teaching perspective.

Ready to help your students move beyond "nice" and "mean" when describing characters? Here are 6 ways to build their character traits vocabulary!

If you are looking to add some high-interest activities, try teaching character traits with the short film Geri’s Game.

Upper elementary ideas to teach character traits and character conflict using anchor charts, interactive notebook templates, and task cards.

Model character change and character development with The Hula Hoopin Queen and download our free book companion resource.

Help your students become more empathetic and compassionate with these social emotional learning lessons and activity ideas that are perfect for back to school or for building classroom community any time of the year. Pull out a copy of Each Kindness by Jaqueline Woodson and your students will be ready to discuss creating a more compassionate world!