Exposing students to a wide variety of genres is so important to creating lifelong readers. It helps students begin to identify who they are as readers, including their likes and dislikes. By building genre background knowledge they are able to make connections, and ultimately comprehend, a new book of the same genre. This is why it is so important that as teachers we are explicitly teaching genres to elementary students.
WHAT ARE GENRE CRAFTS?
Genre crafts are an engaging, hands on way for teaching genres to elementary students. They are low prep and only require scissors and glue (metal fasteners for the spinner crafts).
WHY ARE THEY HELPFUL FOR TEACHING GENRES TO ELEMENTARY STUDENTS?
Each genre craft was designed to give students a visual cue for what makes up the genre. For example, the science fiction crafts are a rocket ship or robot.
Each genre comes with different genre craft options as well. This allows students to use a different craft for different books of the same genre.
The graphic organizers inside the crafts vary based on each genre. Some fill ins include character, setting, summary, elements of genre, book review, genre review, thoughts on the genre, etc.
GENRES INCLUDED:
- Realistic Fiction
- Historical Fiction
- Science Fiction
- Fantasy
- Horror
- Poetry
- Comedy
- Romance
- Tragedy
- Mystery
- Adventure
- Graphic Novel
- Traditional Literature
- Folktale
- Fable
- Fairy Tale
- Legend
- Tall Tale
- Myth
- Drama
- Fiction
- Nonfiction
- Literary Nonfiction
- Autobiography
- Biography
- How To
The genre crafts are available in my TpT shop by individual genre unit (which also includes a poster for the genre, bookmark, graphic organizers and tab book). They are also available in a bundle of all of the genre crafts:
INDIVIDUAL GENRE UNITS:
- Literary Nonfiction/Narrative Nonfiction
- Historical Fiction
- Realistic Fiction
- Science Fiction
- Mystery
- Fantasy
- Horror
- Comedy
- Adventure
- Biography & Autobiography
- Fables & Folktales
- Legends & Tall Tales
- Tragedy & Romance
- Mythology
- Fairy Tales
- Graphic Novels
Related Blog Post: Teaching Genres to Elementary Students: From Setting up a Classroom Library to Independent Genre Activities
