LESSON PLAN

PRIOR KNOWLEDGE:
Students should know a story is made up of characters, setting and plot events.
OBJECTIVES:
Having read a given passage, students will be able to identify story elements.

After learning a song, students will be able to explain in their own words what character traits
and motivations mean.

Using word cards and a graphic organizer, students will be able to differentiate between good
and bad traits.

INSTRUCTIONAL RESOURCES:
Paper, pencil, graphic organizer, construction paper, word cards, short passages, markers, computer,
speakers

CONTENT: Character Traits are descriptive adjectives that are used to describe someone's
personality. They tell what a person is like. Character traits are sometimes described as good or bad,
and everyone has them.
Some positive character traits might include:

Honest

Kind

Happy

Sincere

Patient

Some negative character traits might include:

Rude

Angry

Mean

Mad

Untrusting

Greedy

A characters motivations are the reason why he or she acts in a certain way. Thinking about a
characters traits and motivations will help you figure out why a character took a certain action in a
story.

Introduction: The teacher will play a short song that is describing a person. She will instruct students
to give examples of adjectives they heard in the song that describe a person.
METHODS AND TECHNIQUES
STUDENTS ACTIVITIES

Whole Instruction
The teacher will tell students that the words they listed are examples of character
traits.
She will tell them that Character Traits are descriptive adjectives that are used to
describe someone's personality. They tell what a person is like.
The teacher will play another song that gives the definition of character trait and
have students learn the short song.
The teacher will then display a short passage and ask students to infer what type of
person the main character is using character traits.
The teacher will write a list of character traits as the students say them.
She will ask the students to think of other character traits that were not listed and
add them to the list.
The teacher will explain to students that there are good and bad character traits.
Cooperative Grouping
The teacher will give each group a short story to read.
She will instruct them to read aloud within their groups.
The teacher will tell the students to complete a graphic organizer that asks them to
identify the characters, quotes from the story and their inferred character traits.

Students will listen as the teacher explains what cha

traits are.

Students will learn the words of the Character Tra

Song

Students will read a short passage together and infer

type of person the character is.

Students will tell the teacher what character traits th

came up with.
Students will think of other examples of character tr

Each group will work together to identify the charac

quotes from the story and their inferred character tra

Individual assessment

The teacher will give each student a worksheet to differentiate between good and
bad character traits.

CONCLUSION: The teacher will have students sing the character traits song.
Evaluation:

Students will complete short worksheet that asks t

cut and paste good and bad character traits in the
category.