In the book, Scientific Reading Assessment, (Manning, Chumley, and Underbakke), there is a great lesson on comprehending similes and metaphors. Sometimes ELLs do not understand the comparisons using the words like or as, unless they are specifically taught to look for these literary devices. I have already taught a mini-lesson on similes during writing workshop, but I want to try the lesson they suggest in the book. The authors suggest using the picture book, Peepers by Eve Bunting. In addition to just identifying the metaphors (which are plentiful in this book!), it is useful to have a meaningful discussion on the comparisons being made. I think this will encourage my students to use more similes in their own writing, and will build their vocabularies at the same time. Metaphors require more abstract thinking, but it is still useful for students to identify them even if they do not use them in their own writing.
I will conduct this lesson with my 4th and 5th grade ELLs and post our results next week. I will also post their responses in writing to this book. Let’s see if they increase their use of similes in their writing!
That sounds like an interesting lesson plan. I would like to borrow the book and see if it would be a good one to use with my reading/writing group to review similies and metaphors.