I love when we find a book that’s exciting to read but full of springboards for learning, too, and that’s exactly what Tara Dairman’s All Four Stars is.
It’s the wonderful story of Gladys, a young girl who dreams of writing restaurant and foodie reviews for a major New York newspaper. We read this book in our book clubs (more about that soon!) and I created a unit study and a vocabulary/writing pack with All Four Stars in mind.
Throughout the story, Gladys takes trips into New York City, where she visits landmarks and navigates the city. She also eats food from around the world and is a great writer, and all of these make great springboards to study things like the anatomy of the brain, idioms, and the architecture of Penn Station. This novel study is 45 pages of creative learning activities. Want to know more? Check it out here.
All Four Stars is smoothly and well written. It takes place entirely in New York, but it is very culturally diverse, and so there are words from a variety of languages throughout the book. There are also ethical dilemmas, dreams for the future, and quite a lot of the main character’s writing throughout the story. This pack is full of vocabulary activities and writing/discussion prompts that come directly from these story elements. Want to know more? Check it out here.
These All Four Stars packs are designed to keep your students learning from the first page of the book until the last. If your students love to read – or don’t, but you’d like them to – these studies are the perfect way to combine their learning with their reading.
Find these and other fun learning projects at my Teachers Pay Teachers store here.
