I love using the winter holidays to teach my students about traditions and beliefs around the world. This week we are spotlighting the book The Tomten because it is a great example about the customs in Scandanavian countries. Teachers can use this book to compare the Tomten to other things like Santa! - Jodi and the Starts With a Story Team
SUMMARY
The Tomten by Astrid Lindgren tells the Scandinavian story of a gnome. In this book, the Tomten lives on an old farm and visits the people and animals during the night. While humans have never seen him, they know he is there because of his little footprints in the snow. It takes place during the long, frigid winter while everyone is wishing for spring. As the Tomten visits the cows, the sheep, the dog, and the children he offers words of hope and reminds them to be grateful. He speaks his own, silent language that the animals can understand.Â
Students will enjoy listening to this sweet folktale from another country. Â
USE THIS BOOK TO TEACH:
The Tomten can be used to teach so many different skills. It lends itself to teaching a variety of reading strategies and it can be used as a mentor text for different types of writing. Relating your lessons to a read aloud truly engages students.
- Use students prior knowledge to compare and contrast the Tomten to other things they know.
- Practice retelling skills and sequence events in the story.
- Teach students to write about their opinion by providing reasons to support their ideas.
- Engage students in “how to” writing related to the story.Â
- Review adjectives and compound words.
- Explore prepositions and prepositional phrases.Â
- Have a class discussion on kindness.
NO-PREP PRINTABLE ACTIVITIES:
If you are looking for “ready to go” activities for the first day of school, be sure to check out the book companion. With it you’ll receive all of the following resources to align with this specific book:
- comprehension questions
- 30Â writing prompts with themed paper
- vocabulary activities
- word study print & go activities
- ideas for grammar lessons with focus sentence printables
- social emotional learning discussion topics
- graphic organizers to target specific comprehension skills and strategies
We are so excited to share our Starts With a Story book companion for The Tomten. We know teachers will love using these lesson plans so make sure you check out this awesome resource.
GET THE PRINTABLE ACTIVITIES
ADDITIONAL BOOK SUGGESTIONS
You and your students will also love these similar books:
- The Trouble With Trolls by Jan Brett
- The Legend of Old Befana by Tomie dePaola
- Cobweb Christmas by Jane Manning
- The Empty Pot by Demi
TRY OUT A SAMPLE COMPANION
It's hard to explain how amazing the Starts with a Story book companions are because there is just so much goodness included in each one. It's best if you experience using one for yourself. Sign up below & we'll send you an entire book companion to try out for FREE!
