Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Hidden Story Hunt


My son’s reading has come a long way but getting him to read more than 5 pages is still a bit of a struggle. To give him some extra motivation, I used a Scooby-Doo easy reader book to create a fun activity that would make him WANT to read.

This activity is a hybrid of the Treasure Hunt and Scrambled Story activities we’ve done in the past. First, I retyped the book's text, making one “card” per each page of the book. There were 11 cards in all. Then I printed and cut them out.

Hiding small pieces of paper all over our house would have most certainly been frustrating. To make it easier, I limited the hunt to our living room, kitchen, and dining area. I also attached some gift-wrap bows (left over from Christmas) to the backs of the cards. Now all that was left to do was hide them.


My son was excited for the hunt. I told him to look for 11 bows. As he found each of them, I took the opportunity to ask him, “How many do you have left to find?” (I couldn’t resist sneaking in a little subtraction practice!)


When my son found all 11, he pulled the bows off and read the cards. 


Now came the hard part: put them in the right order. We read several cards multiple times, making sure the sequence was right. This was hard and a lot of reading but my son never complained. 


I wish I had a video camera to show you his happy dance when the story was put back in order; He was so proud of himself!

Personalize this activity to match your child's reading proficiency and interests. Ten (10) minutes at the computer and 5 minutes hiding the cards is all the preparation needed for this great activity!!

9 comments:

  1. I just found your blog through a link on Pinterest and can't wait to dig through your files! You have some incredible stuff here that I'm excited to use in my first grade classroom! Thank you for sharing!!

    Oh My Little Classity Class

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  2. What fun! We did something similar more geared for younger kids hiding the animals found in "Brown Bear, Brown Bear." http://thegoldengleam.blogspot.com/2011/06/happy-birthday-eric-carle.html

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  3. LOVE it!! Can you add an email subscription option. I'd love to not miss a post!!
    Beth =-)

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  4. I really like this idea, especially for boys that don't like to sit still and focus on reading. It adds a little adventure to their reading journey!

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  5. This is such a great to work on comprehension and work with a story in a new way.

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  6. What a great reading activity! Love the idea of attaching bows to make it extra special, too!

    Thanks for sharing at Learning Laboratory at Mama Smiles =)

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  7. Love this idea! We frequently do treasure hunts. I am definitely going to add this treasure hunt into our reading routine.

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  8. I've featured your wonderful post here: http://e-expeditions.com/tours/2012/01/11/links-we-love-reading-activities/

    Have a great day! :)

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