This Flashlight Readers activity uses the novel Esperanza Rising, by Pam Muñoz Ryan, as inspiration to improve student's writing skills.

Students enjoy reading Esperanza Rising, by Pam Muñoz Ryan, because of her effective writing style, lyrical prose, and beautiful imagery. This Flashlight Readers activity uses the novel as inspiration to improve student's writing skills. They will use story starters and historical fiction journal writing as a background for this development.

Learning Objectives

While participating in “Flashlight Readers,” students will:

• Offer observations, make connections, react, speculate, interpret, and raise questions in response to text
• Identify and discuss book themes, characters, plots, and settings
• Connect their experiences with those of the author and/or with characters from the books
• Support predictions, interpretations, conclusions, etc. with examples from text
• Practice key reading skills and strategies (cause-and-effect, problem/solution, compare-and-contrast, summarizing, etc.)
• Monitor their own comprehension
• Discuss ideas from the book with you, the author, and/or other students online

Benchmarks for Esperanza Rising Flashlight Readers Lesson Plans

Language Arts Standards (4th Ed.)

Lesson 1: A Picture Is Worth a Thousand Words Lesson Plan

• Evaluates own and others' writing (e.g., applies criteria generated by self and others, uses self-assessment to set and achieve goals as a writer, participates in peer response groups)
• Writes narrative accounts, such as short stories (e.g., establishes a situation, plot, persona, point of view, setting, conflict, and resolution; creates an organizational structure that balances and unifies all narrative aspects of the story; uses a range of strategies and literary devices such as dialogue, tension, suspense, naming, figurative language, and specific narrative action such as movement, gestures, and expressions)
• Reflects on what has been learned after reading and formulates ideas, opinions, and personal responses to texts

Lesson 2: Journal of Time, a Historical Perspective Lesson Plan

• Evaluates own and others' writing (e.g., applies criteria generated by self and others, uses self-assessment to set and achieve goals as a writer, participates in peer response groups)
• Understands reasons for varied interpretations of visual media (e.g., different purposes or circumstances while viewing, influence of personal knowledge and experiences, focusing on different stylistic features)
• Uses strategies (e.g., adapts focus, organization, point of view; determines knowledge and interests of audience) to write for different audiences (e.g., self, peers, teachers, adults)
• Writes in response to literature (e.g., responds to significant issues in a log or journal, connects knowledge from a text with personal knowledge, states an interpretive, evaluative, or reflective position; draws inferences about the effects of the work on an audience)

Lesson 3: Pam Muñoz Ryan Shares Writing Secrets Lesson Plan

• Evaluates own and others' writing (e.g., applies criteria generated by self and others, uses self-assessment to set and achieve goals as a writer, participates in peer response groups)
• Writes narrative accounts, such as short stories (e.g., establishes a situation, plot, persona, point of view, setting, conflict, and resolution; creates an organizational structure that balances and unifies all narrative aspects of the story; uses a range of strategies and literary devices such as dialogue, tension, suspense, naming, figurative language, and specific narrative action such as movement, gestures, and expressions)

Related Resources

Esperanza Rising Teacher's Guide

Uses the beloved novel Esperanza Rising by Pam Muñoz Ryan as inspiration to improve students' writing skills. Students use story starters and historical fiction journal writing as a background.

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Flashlight Readers

Fun activities that let students go inside nine popular and highly-taught books.

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