How To Teach a Short Story

Teaching a lesson is very much like writing an essay--you need all the same parts.

Introduction
Story Title:

How are you going to get your students’ interest? (Hook)

What do you want your students to learn? Learning Objectives: these can be your own, from the Ministry of Education, etc... (Thesis Statement) Everything in your lesson should be aimed at helping students meet your learning objectives.

Body
What activities are you going to present that help your students meet your objectives? These must include reading the story in some format but are also other activities such as independent work, discussions with a partner, a small group or the whole class. They may also include enrichment activities like a game or a video, etc. There is much room here for creativity. The activities you choose should help your students make a personal connection to the material you're covering. They should also help your students put the work into it's larger social and literary context (see Realms of Inquiry for further information).

Conclusion
How will you determine that your students’ learned the material? These can be game results, quizs, questionaires, a test or some kind of project. The project can be anything from a paragraph or two to a full essay. Other kinds of projects work too. Think creatively about getting your students to use both text and images.

Why does this story matter? Remember that personal connection? See if you can get your students talking about why the story matters to them.

Work Habits
You also need to decide who is going to do which parts of your lesson. You also need to know the order events will take as well as the duration of each part. Your complete lesson plan also contains a list of materials and who will be providing the materials.