Today’s guest blogger is Scholastic News assistant editor, Cynthia Meadow. Cynthia is a former early-grade teacher as well. She shares some tips about using Scholastic News to teach the classic winter book, The Mitten, by Jan Brett.  

Do you teach The Mitten, by Jan Brett, to your class? When I was an assistant teacher in a first-grade class, I taught The Mitten as a wintertime library lesson for my students. I could see that they loved the story and the animals in it as much as I did.

At the same time, the Common Core State Standards demand that we teach more nonfiction than ever before. That’s why I wish I’d had this month’s Scholastic News mini book “Winter in the Wild” when I was teaching. It offers children an in-depth look at each animal featured in The Mitten, with photographs, facts, and all the other nonfiction text features you expect from our magazine. Teaching our issue along with Jan’s book provides a perfect side-by-side comparison of fiction and nonfiction texts.

In the video below, Scholastic News Editor Laine Falk explains exactly how to use “Winter in the Wild,” The Mitten, and our extensive online resources to teach this crucial first-grade skill.

My favorite part of this fiction/nonfiction lesson is an exclusive Scholastic News interview with Jan Brett. It reveals how she used facts about animals when illustrating her book. So, if you have a child who raises her hand to point out that the bear in the story should be hibernating? Jan says that she painted the scene so that the little boy wakes up the bear as he walks over its den!

We’d love to hear about your experiences using Scholastic News in your classroom!