Talking' about Traits

As part of our Iowa Goldfinch Award work, students spent some time talking about character traits. To help us understand the difference between a character trait and other traits (like appearance), we used everyone's favorite orange cat as an example.

We decided that a character trait had to do with a person's (or cat's!) personality. So, while we could all say that Garfield was a big, orange cat, we couldn't say those traits referred to his personality. Instead, we decided that he was lazy.

Then, it was on to more Goldfinch read-aloud books to practice talking about character traits in books. We used This a Moose and Meet the Dullards for this activity.

Students talked about two groups of characters from each book: Moose and Duck from This is a Moose and the parents and the kids from Meet the Dullards. Here are some of the descriptors they arrived at when talking about character traits:

Moose: determined, brave

Duck: angry, hypocritical

Parents: boring, surprised

Kids: bored, sneaky

Students then used Flipgrid to record their thinking. Using our lists of traits, students chose a character and trait, then said why they believed that character showed that trait. Click on the link in the caption to access the students' responses.

CLICK HERE to access the grid.

Stay tuned--we're not done yet with our Iowa Goldfinch Award nominees!