Unit Plan
A Dog's Life Teaching Guide
This unit based on Ann M. Martin's A Dog's Life challenges students to create stories from a first- or third-person point of view, make plot decisions, and examine the author's writing process.
Grades
3–5
Duration
7 DAYS
Quick links to unit plan resources:
Overview
Ann M. Martin takes readers on a journey with Squirrel through the trials, tragedies, and triumphs of the stray dog's life. Creatively told from Squirrel's perspective, A Dog's Life gives readers an inside view of the kind of life a homeless dog might experience and helps raise awareness of the responsibilities of pet ownership. The interactive elements of the A Dog's Life Flashlight Readers activity and the lessons in this teaching guide challenge students to create stories from a first- or third-person point of view, make decisions to drive the plot of a story, and examine the author's writing process in order to apply some of her techniques to their own writing.
Objectives
Students will:
- Use text, images, and dialogue to construct a sequence of scenes and then write a story about the scenes using a first- or third-person point of view
- Reason through and make choices to steer a story's plot
- Use a map of sequenced events to tell a story
- View slideshows about Ann M. Martin's life as a writer and the process of creating A Dog's Life to learn about the author and her process
- Use the author's writing process as a model to create their own stories
A Tale to Tell: Writing From the Perspectives of Animals
Students will use the Flashlight Readers activity to choose characters and settings and use them to create scenes for a story. Students will use an outline to organize events into sequence then write stories from the first-person or third-person perspective.
GRADES
3–5
DURATION
3 DAYS
Bone's Adventures: Examining Plot in A Dog's Life and Beyond
Students read the chapter entitled "Throwaways" from A Dog's Life, and put themselves in the character Bone's place. After a discussion about plot, students will use the online activity to explore what could have happened to Bone, a secondary character in the novel.
GRADES
3–5
DURATION
1 DAY
Ann M. Martin's Writing Model
Features a lesson plan in which students learn about author Ann M. Martin's writing process for the book, A Dog's Life. Students then use the author's model to inspire their own writing.
GRADES
3–5
DURATION
3 DAYS
Featured Book
Featured Activity
Scholastic offers students the unique opportunity to get the story behind A Dog's Life from the author, Ann M. Martin, herself!
GRADES
3–5, 6–8
Featured Reproducibles
Appears in This Collection
Grades
3-8
Reading level
U
Hardcover Book
$12.74
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