Welcome back to our Teacher Toolkit Series!
Today, we are going to go over the COLORFUL concept of
teaching MOOD in literature!
Get your berets ready because we are going to paint you a
MASTERPIECE!
Today, we are going to go over the COLORFUL concept of
teaching MOOD in literature!
Get your berets ready because we are going to paint you a
MASTERPIECE!
Our students always get excited with a cute anchor chart to start things off.
Anchor charts create a visual for students to reference back to.
Our focus is the READER when teaching mood!
Anchor charts create a visual for students to reference back to.
Our focus is the READER when teaching mood!
After students have the concept of mood, we practice finding the mood with some of our favorite picture books. The key is to find picture books that give a variety of moods! For example, Silly Tilly’s mood was humorous and Where the Wild Things Are’s mood was imaginative.
Another fun way to teach mood in literature is to teach mood with MUSIC!
Students love hearing their favorite songs to spur their interest and ignite engagement! We love listening to Kidz Bop in our class! Students pulled out the mood of BORED, FED UP, and TIRED in one of their favorite songs, “Same Old Love” and POWERFUL and COURAGEOUS in the song, “Confident.”
We love hooking them in with what they love most!
Students love hearing their favorite songs to spur their interest and ignite engagement! We love listening to Kidz Bop in our class! Students pulled out the mood of BORED, FED UP, and TIRED in one of their favorite songs, “Same Old Love” and POWERFUL and COURAGEOUS in the song, “Confident.”
We love hooking them in with what they love most!
Click below to Download this FREEBIE!
Our theme came from our idea to center teaching mood around colors. For this, we use the color wheel and associated different moods with different colors.
Do the same for your class by downloading this FREEBIE that practices using colors to teach mood! When teaching mood, we had students close their eyes and imaging different objects. For example, we had them picture the sky for blue and a tree for green. We had students write how they felt while imagining these objects. After our discussion, we gave them a chart with the different colors and moods, that we felt, fell under each color. We used this chart throughout our unit.
Do the same for your class by downloading this FREEBIE that practices using colors to teach mood! When teaching mood, we had students close their eyes and imaging different objects. For example, we had them picture the sky for blue and a tree for green. We had students write how they felt while imagining these objects. After our discussion, we gave them a chart with the different colors and moods, that we felt, fell under each color. We used this chart throughout our unit.
Our fun activity (that is available for FREE in our GIVEAWAY below) that we made goes PERFECTLY with our theme… PAINT BY MOOD!
Students loved this activity!
You can get it in our store if you have to have it now!
Students loved this activity!
You can get it in our store if you have to have it now!
Of course, our students’ favorite part was the colorful snack!
Students were able to “paint” their cupcakes with their moods from their book.
After reading, we had students paint their cupcake the color of their mood and explain it to their table group. This was a great Book Share while practicing mood!
Students were able to “paint” their cupcakes with their moods from their book.
After reading, we had students paint their cupcake the color of their mood and explain it to their table group. This was a great Book Share while practicing mood!
For a fun art activity, we capitalized on the theme of being artists. While reading, the students listed their moods throughout the book. After reading The Dot, students were able to paint their own dots with their mood’s color!
Here’s what we have noticed about teaching mood in literature over the years…
1. Students always try to ask us if they have the correct answer. They are so used to getting a correct answer and they need to realize that mood is subjective (within reason). The most important point to make is that as long as they support their mood with events from the text, they have the “correct” answer. We all have different interpretations of the same event and this needs to be a discussion to have in your classroom.
2. Students should be noticing that the Mood Changes! Moods change within the book from chapter to chapter or sometimes, even page to page! We have found it helpful to have them use a mood tracker to record their moods AS THEY ARE READING and NOT WAITING UNTIL THE END! Also, when students use a “Mood Tracker,” it is easier for them to get the overall mood of a book. They are able to see what mood happened the most often throughout the book to make a general statement. When students do not use a mood tracker, they tend to give the mood of the last chapter instead.
Here is a great YouTube video that goes over the concept teaching MOOD and TONE… which brings us to our next blog post! Come back next week for our next TOOL… Teaching TONE in literature! We like to teach these concepts together, because they are easily confused.
Want more resources for teaching MOOD? Check out everything that is available in our Bundle!
