Read Alouds for all Readers by Molly Ness promotes the importance of reading aloud to ones class, regardless of age. Ness offers steps to create a “Read Aloud” (found below).
My partner and I read “The Inquisitive Raven” by Richard Wagamese, an Ojibwe author, to a grade 5 class. The book describes how Rueben’s inquisitiveness leads him to learn a very important lesson.
For this activity I considered Indigenous Perspectives and First Peoples Principles of Learning.
Learning involves generational roles and responsibilities; and learning involves recognizing the consequences of one’s actions. Rueben learned from his actions how important his role within the community is, and that all creatures have respect for one another.
This book also embodies the different roles family members have in raising youth.
Read Aloud Template
We did our read aloud activity over three days.
Day One: We read from page 1 to page 7.
We had a little more time this day to do a drawing and writing activity. We brought books from the library with tons of different mammals, birds, fish, insects, and lizards. Students were asked to pick an animal they admire and draw it. There were a few students who went really in depth with their drawings, adding a lot of details and showing their admirable qualities. Others were a little silly, but for the most part they engaged really well. The second part of the activity had the students writing two-four sentences about what they admire about their animal. Many students filled up the rest of the page and had a lot to say about what made their animals special.
Day Two: We read from page 8 to page 23.
This day the book section was substantially longer. I would even say it was a tad too long. Some students were starting to get fidgety near the end, and I could hear little side conversations as my partner read.
For the activity we made station cards. Students were given a blank piece of paper to use throughout the stations. In the future I would make the stations clearer on the paper.
Station 1: What qualities do we admire in people? List 3 qualities.
Station 2: What does admiration look like? Draw a symbol to represent something you admire.
Station 3: How can admiration influence us? Finish the sentences: “I admire people who_____?” “I could practice this by_____?”
Station 4: Why do we admire people? Finish the sentences: “This quality helps others by_____.” “This quality makes our community better because_____?”
Day Three: We read from page 24 to page to the end.
For this activity we did a mini lesson on making a tableau. We had one volunteer come up and my partner and I, along with our student volunteer created a tableau that the rest of the class had to guess. Next, we split the class into groups of 3 (one group of 4 girls and one group of 2 boys). Each group was given a scene from the book. The groups took turns presenting their tableaux for the class, and we all had to guess which scene it was. Following that we handed out admirable traits for each group to come up with their own ideas for how to display that trait. Some of the ideas were really wonderful. This day was by far the best as everyone stayed engaged and very little redirection was needed.
BC Curriculum Connections
Activity 1 falls under the grade 5 English Language Arts Curricular Competency: Use a variety of comprehension strategies before, during, and after reading, listening, or viewing to guide inquiry and deepen understanding of text.
Activity 2 falls under the grade 5 English Language Arts Curricular Competency: Use personal experience and knowledge to connect to text and develop understanding of self, community, and world.
Activity 3 falls under the grade 5 Arts Curricular Competency: Interpret and communicate ideas using symbols and elements to express meaning through the arts.
References
Curriculum. (n.d.-a). https://curriculum.gov.bc.ca/
First peoples principles of learning. First Nations Education Steering Committee FNESC. (n.d.-a). https://www.fnesc.ca/first-peoples-principles-of-learning/
Wagamese, R., & George, B. (2025). The inquisitive Raven. D&M Kids.