Example Lesson Plan: The Day the Crayons Quit.
Children’s Choices Picture Book—The Day the Crayons Quit (Daywalt, 2013), 40 pages
Grades: Pre-K, K to 3
Storyline— One day Duncan takes out his crayon box, instead, he finds 12 letters, each one
written by the crayons themselves. Cleverly, each of the 12 crayons expresses their opinion and
feelings about how Duncan uses them. Some of the crayons are overworked, others underused,
two crayons argue about which color the sun is best painted in, and worst one crayon was never
used. After reading the letters, Duncan decides to color in a new and creative way.
Content Objective 1 To discuss the text, The Day the Crayons Quit, which is written from each
crayon’s point of view, meant to persuade Duncan to color differently by stating what action each
crayon would like Duncan to take.
Content Objective 2: To use the book as a mentor text to write persuasively.
Language Objective 1: To introduce eight Tier Two cognate words: brilliantly–muy brillante;
career–carrera; clearly–claramente; completely–completamente; creativity–creatividad;
fabulous–fabuloso; occasional–occasional; and prove–comprobar.
Language Objective 2: To teach suffix generalizations –ly–mente: clearly–claramente;
completely–completamente are from the story and add other examples occasionally–
ocasionalmente finally–finalmente; especially–especialmente; rapidly–rápidamente.
Language Objective 3: To teach the spelling rule that double consonants in English often
become single consonants in Spanish using cognates from the book: class/clase;
hippopotamus/hipopótamo; occasionally/ocasionalmente; and princess/princesa.
Procedure
CHILDREN’S CHOICES AND SPANISH–ENGLISH COGNATES
Pre–Teach the Cognate Vocabulary. Begin the lesson by introducing the cognate words
students will encounter in the read aloud. Show the students each Spanish cognate word on a
flash card and ask for the English word. For example, with the cognate pair brilliantly–muy
brillante, “What is the English word for muy brillante?” (brilliantly). Place the two cognate
words one stacked above the other for children to see their spelling and to note the similarities
and differences. Introduce all eight cognate words asking students to give the English word for
the Spanish word shown.
Read the Book. Read aloud and stop to ask questions that enhance understanding. Questions can
include: What made this crayon unhappy? What made this crayon disappointed? What solution
did the crayon propose? How did Duncan take into account their suggestions?
Read Closely. What arguments did the different crayons make? For example, the red and blue
crayons; pink and peach crayons; green crayon; black and gray crayons, yellow and orange
crayons. What solutions did these crayons propose?
Big Idea. Altogether, what did the crayons want? Were the crayons making a reasonable request?
Why or why not?
Cognate Vocabulary Review and Instruction. To further students’ cognate vocabulary
knowledge, the teacher can return to the story to discuss the cognate vocabulary in context. For
example: (Orange crayon) “We both know that I am clearly the color of the sun because on
Thursday you used me to color the sun…”
(Pink crayon) “Could you PLEASE use me sometime to color the occasional pink dinosaur or
monster or cowboy?”
“When Duncan showed his teacher his new picture, she gave him an A for coloring… and an A+
for creativity!”
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CHILDREN’S CHOICES AND SPANISH–ENGLISH COGNATES
Cognate Morphology Lesson. To introduce the suffix generalization: –ly in English adverbs is
equivalent to –mente in Spanish adverbs with the words from the story: clearly–claramente;
completely–completamente. Create an anchor chart with two columns: one for English cognates (i.e.,
clearly, completely) and a second for Spanish cognates (i.e., claramente, completamente).
Have students predict the suffix patterns and make the generalization that English adverbs that
end in –ly are equivalent to Spanish adverbs that end in –mente.
Other examples can be added, such as finally–finalmente, especially–especialmente, and simply–
simplemente.
Cognate Spelling Lesson. Introduce the spelling generalization: English words with double
consonants become Spanish cognates having only one consonant. The example spelling cognates
pairs taken from the picture book are: class/clase, hippopotamus/hipopótamo,
occasionally/ocasionalmente, and princess/princesa.
Writing Activity
This text can be used as a mentor text for persuasive writing because children can relate to the
reasons the crayons had for feeling overused, underused, or not used at all. Review the how the
crayons expressed the problem, reasons, and solution.
Students can write from their own point of view letters based on how they use the colors in their
crayon box. Further, the class could make a class book or each child could make their own stack
of crayon letters.
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