Mentor Text Reading Activities & Writing Prompts: 2nd Grade Better Than Basal

This product is JAM-PACKED with Common Core aligned lesson ideas, activities, graphic organizers, and writing prompts for 40 of your favorite mentor texts to use in second grade! (See the complete list below.) With over 100 graphic organizers WITH answer keys, you'll be set for the year (and years after that, too)! It also includes the generic versions of the graphic organizers so you can use them with any book!

★ Activities are also provided as links to Google Slides for Digital Learning! ★

Several of my followers who use my Second Grade Mentor Sentence Units asked for reading and writing units to go with all the mentor texts, too. Because of those requests, this product was born! (You do not have to use Mentor Sentences to use these activities in your classroom...)

Not familiar with mentor sentences? Read all about them here!

You might also be interested in the Second Grade Vivid Vocabulary Companion Bundle: includes vocabulary activities to use the words IN CONTEXT from the same books in all the mentor sentence sets.

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WHAT’S INCLUDED?

**Please LOOK AT THE PREVIEW to see all that is included!**

Activities cover skills such as:

identify key details

answer the 5 W's

summarize the story

main idea and details

find the moral/central message with details

identify lessons learned

identify/describe character feelings

identify character challenges and their responses

make lists of rhyming words

understand beginning, middle, end

problem/solution

relate through two points of view within a story

describe characters and setting through illustrations

compare two books

...and more!

There is also a writing prompt for every book that ties to the theme, idea, or topic of the book. Get this free "At-A-Glance" download to see the skills covered for all 40 books!

Activities are for the following books:

-First Day Jitters By Julie Danneberg

-Officer Buckle and Gloria By Peggy Rathmann

-Memoirs of a Goldfish By Devin Scillian

-Chrysanthemum By Kevin Henkes

-Scaredy Squirrel By Melanie Watt

-Skippyjon Jones By Judy Schachner

-If You Give A Mouse A Cookie By Laura Joffe Numeroff

-The Paperboy By Dav Pilkey

-Stellaluna By Janell Cannon

-The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything By Linda Williams

-The Day The Crayons Quit By Drew Daywalt

-Diary of a Worm By Doreen Cronin

-Diary of a Fly By Doreen Cronin

-‘Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving By Dav Pilkey

-Snowmen at Night By Caralyn Buehner

-Snowmen at Christmas By Caralyn Buehner

-The Polar Express By Chris Van Allsburg

-Gingerbread Baby By Jan Brett

-The Three Snow Bears By Jan Brett

-Three Cheers for Tacky By Helen Lester

-100th Day Worries by Margery Cuyler

-Substitute Groundhog by Pat Miller

-Roses are Pink, Your Feet Really Stink by Diane de Groat

-Duck For President by Doreen Cronin

-What If You Had Animal Teeth!? by Sandra Markle

-Sweet Tooth by Margie Palatini

-Moosetache by Margie Palatini

-Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs by Judi Barrett

-The Umbrella by Jan Brett

-Michael Recycle by Ellie Bethel

-The Important Book by Margeret Wise Brown

-Parts by Tedd Arnold

-Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day by Judith Viorst

-Corduroy by Don Freeman

-Click, Clack, Moo Cows That Type by Doreen Cronin

-A Chair For My Mother by Vera B. Williams

-Stone Soup by Ann McGovern

-Smelly Socks by Robert Munsch

-Thunder Cake by Patricia Polacco

-Don’t Let The Pigeon Stay Up Late! by Mo Willems

If you don't own all these books, I encourage you to take advantage of your library! They are all wonderful texts to share with your students!

Looking for NONFICTION? Grab this Animals Better Than Basal!

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HOW DO I USE BETTER THAN BASAL?

Want more information on how to use mentor texts in the classroom? You can check out my blog posts:

Mentor Texts: Maximize Your Time!

Picture Books Are For EVERYONE!!

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DO YOU LOVE TO SAVE MONEY?

All of the books in this pack also have mentor sentence lessons you can find HERE in the Second Grade Bundle.

There is also now a BIG bundle with all Mentor Sentences, Modifications for Revising and Imitating, Language Arts Interactive Notebooks, Reading Activities, Writing Prompts, and the Vivid Vocabulary Companions for all 40 books! Check out the Biggest and BEST Yearlong Bundle for Second Grade!

Do you do an author study of Kevin Henkes?

Check out the Kevin Henkes Mentor Sentences Mini-Unit!

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WHAT ABOUT OTHER GRADE LEVELS?

There is a Volume 1 Better Than Basal for grades 3-5! Check out what’s in Volume 1!

There is also a Volume 2 Better Than Basal for grades 3-5. Check out what’s in Volume 2!

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Please remember, this purchase is for the use of one teacher. It is not intended to be shared. Please use the 'additional license' purchase if more than one teacher will be using it. Thank you!

Copyright © 2015 Ideas By Jivey, LLC

All rights reserved by author, Jessica Ivey.

Permission to copy for single classroom use only.

Electronic distribution limited to single classroom use only.

Not for public display.

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