Even though reading is a regular part of the core curriculum, we know that it can be difficult to come up with new ideas on how to teach the core standards during your read aloud time. The best part of being a part of The Core Coaches community is that you don’t have to do it alone!
Making effective and engaging read aloud lesson plans, like this Thelma the Unicorn Read Aloud, is one of our FAVORITE things to do. Our next favorite thing? Sharing these read alouds with amazing educators, like you!
Thelma the Unicorn Lesson Plan
Thelma the Unicorn is one of over 50 read aloud resources we have created for preschool, kindergarten, and first grade. We have made it easy for you to teach these lessons in your classroom.
This read aloud follows a tried and tested structure that engages students with core reading skills while also helping them further develop their love for reading. To make this even better, these lesson plans are designed to cover up to five days worth of reading!
Come with me as I share all the wonderful learning experiences your students will engage with during their reading of Thelma the Unicorn.
The first time I taught Thelma the Unicorn in my classroom, I had just discovered this magical book by Aaron Blabey at our school’s Scholastic Book Fair. I instantly fell in love with this darling story about learning to love who you are and knew I had to share it with my students.
Not only is the story of Thelma inspirational, but the structure of the story is perfect for teaching several elements of reading. From the first page until the end, Aaron Blabey has created learning opportunities on every page.
Reading Comprehension Questions for Thelma the Unicorn
At the core of all of our read aloud lesson plans are text dependent questions. These questions begin from the first moment students see the book until after they put it down. Moreover, they are designed to invite students back to the book!
As we mentioned above, this read aloud is designed to cover several days of instruction. While this is a benefit to you as the teacher, providing several days of ready to teach lesson plans, this design is rooted in best teaching practices.
By extending the learning over several classes, students get several chances to return to the text. This teaches students the importance of revisiting a text after the first read. It also provides great learning opportunities for completing a close read to analyze specific elements of craft and structure.
If you are new to extending a read aloud over several classes, let me ease any worry that your students will complain about having to read the book again. When I pulled out Thelma the Unicorn for the second read with my students, they couldn’t wait to read it again!
I used our carefully written grade level text dependent questions on the craft and structure of the book to begin this close read. These questions segued into a great discussion about how Thelma’s feelings changed throughout the story.
We also revisited multiple key pages to find evidence in the text and illustrations to justify our thinking. Each time we stopped, I used one of my favorite Rules of Conversation strategies, turn and talk, to provide a structure for students to share their thinking with a partner. After our rich discussion, my students were ready to complete the graphic organizer that explores the character’s feelings.
This experience of my students’ excitement to read Thelma the Unicorn AND revisit it over several days is not unique to this first experience. I experienced this same excitement every year I read this magical book with my kids.
I think it’s as simple as, students love getting to hear this story a second time and they love the support of getting additional time to revisit the text to support their comprehension.
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How to Summarize Thelma the Unicorn
Beyond providing context for exploring text dependent questions, Thelma the Unicorn has a perfect structure for helping students practice summarizing. It is particularly great for using the strategy “Somebody, Wanted, But, So, Then”.
Therefore, we created a graphic organizer using these headings, to help students organize their summary. After asking the text dependent questions about the key ideas and details of the story, students will be ready to complete their summary.
In addition to the graphic organizer for summarizing, we have created graphic organizers to help students explore Story Sequencing, Plot Structure, and Cause and Effect in Thelma and the Unicorn.
Illustrations in Thelma the Unicorn
On day three of this read aloud, you will find several text dependent questions that invite students to return to the text and the illustrations. Not only are illustrations a great way to get student engagement, but they are excellent for teaching analysis and comprehension.
Check for Understanding Activities for Thelma the Unicorn
As you can see from the several learning activities above, each lesson for the first three days of this read provides students a different purpose for revisiting the text, talking about it and responding to it. While these three days of lesson plans provide your students with all of the core content needed for a comprehensive read aloud, we have provided additional learning opportunities.
In addition to the three days of lesson plans above, these additional activities are perfect ways to extend learning and check for understanding. You can use all of these extra learning activities or pick and choose the ones that best suit your students’ needs.
Vocabulary for Thelma the Unicorn
Use these four vocabulary words to further students’ understanding of the text, while expanding their vocabulary.
Thelma the Unicorn Quiz
This short quiz can be used as a formal assessment to check for understanding at the end of the week.
Thelma the Unicorn Writing Prompt
Use our writing page with the prompt, I’m happy being me because… to help students make personal connections to Thelma and the lessons in the book.
Retelling Puppets for Thelma the Unicorn
These unique Retelling puppets are one of our newest editions to our read alouds! Made with illustrations from the book, they are perfect to provide differentiated learning experiences in the classroom.
Retelling puppets can be used to practice speaking and listening skills, to review the text, or to check for understanding. Your students will love having such a creative way to show what they have learned!
Thelma the Unicorn Craft
Let’s be honest, one of the best parts of teaching elementary school is the opportunity to regularly include creative learning opportunities! So, of course we have shared a fun and creative activity for students to show what they learned while reading Thelma and the Unicorn.
Thelma the Unicorn Worksheets
Since we live in a digital world, all of the learning activities for this Thelma and the Unicorn read aloud are available digitally. However, we know that there is still plenty of room in the classroom for good ol’ pencil and paper.
Therefore, all of the learning activities are also available as printables. These worksheets provide students with all of the same learning experiences as the digital activities, just in a non-tech form.
Thelma the Unicorn Lesson Plan Preschool
The more that I saw the love of this picture book in my first grade classroom, I knew other kids would love it too. Therefore, as The Core Coaches we decided to create a preschool read aloud for Thelma the Unicorn to share with young readers.
This prek read aloud includes all of the amazing learning activities in our read aloud for first graders, but in a format curated especially for little learners. Beyond preschool, this read aloud is great for kindergarten too.
After sharing the magic of Thelma the Unicorn with your early readers, check out one our other read alouds for the other delightful books by Aaron Blabey.
