Author Study

One activity that teachers can do with their students is an author study. For an extended period of time, teachers will focus on one specific author and have students read multiple books by that author. Teachers can discuss important information about the author with students before reading the selected books. It is important that teachers start with a planned packet of information for the duration of the study. For students, teachers can make attribute charts to compare and contrast the chosen books, in addition to a biographical chart for students to compare and contrast different authors if more than one author study will be conducted.

For one of my classes, I chose David Adler, which would be an appropriate author for a second or third grade class. I researched important information about David Adler and found facts that children would find interesting to include in my packet. I drafted the different charts I would use in my classroom, in addition to a contact page that I may use with students in a class project. Once I gathered all of my information on the author and chose a selection of books to focus on, I decided to make a poster or bulletin board with all of the information to be hung in the classroom for students to refer back to. On the poster I included a picture of the author, a picture of all of the books the class would be reading, and the fun facts about David Adler. I also chose to do a small spotlight on three of the main characters from the books, however a teacher can do a spotlight on all of the main characters. It is also important to select some overarching themes that can be found across the selection, in addition to an activity that children can do.

For my activity I chose to create a “Photographic Memory” game in honor of his character Cam Jansen. The children have a deck of cards and have to play memory with the images from the selection of David Adler. This is a great way for students to dive into another aspect of the books. While David Adler is an author, in some of his books, he is also the artist. Even if Adler is not the artist, the images and pictures are important aspects to the stories and should not go unnoticed. This is a great way for students to broaden their horizons when it comes to reading, and hopefully, fall in love with an author.