The Right Word: Roget and His Thesaurus

(Image taken from Google.com)

The Right Word: Roget and His Thesaurus 

Bryant, J. & Sweet, M. (2014). The Right Word: Roget and His Thesaurus. Michigan: Eerdmans Books For Young Readers.

Awards: 2015 Caldecott Honor Book, 2015 Sibert Medal Winner, and 2015 Golden Kite Award for Picture Book Illustration

Suggested Delivery: Read Aloud or Individual

Lexile Reading Level: 590L

Age Range: 8-11 years

Grade Level: 3-5

About the Book: The Right Word is about Peter Roget, creator of the thesaurus. Going from a shy, studious child to an accomplished doctor, it follows his growing love for words and classification. The book contains front and back matter with timelines, word lists, quotations, and original photographs that showcase his love of language.

Keywords: Language, Artistry, Passion, Discovery, Intellect

Electronic Resources:

http://www.jenbryant.com/books/inprint/bk_roget.html

Before reading the book, the teacher can show the students the book trailer as an initiation to draw the students in. The author’s website gives other interesting information that can be viewed as well.

http://blaine.org/sevenimpossiblethings/?p=3452#more-3452

After reading the book, it could be interesting to look back at the illustrations, including the front and back matter. The illustrator, Melissa Sweet, has an amazing blog post that can be looked at as it shows how she created the illustrations for the book.

Vocabulary:

-Thesaurus: a dictionary of synonyms and antonyms

-Scholar: a student; someone who has profound knowledge on a subject

-Whippersnapper: an unimportant but rude person, especially a young one.

-Fret: to feel or express worry, annoyance, discontent, or the like

-Classify: to arrange or organize by classes

-Conviction: a fixed or firm belief

Reading Strategies:

-Before reading the text, students can do a Closed Word Sort Mat. This is a type of puzzle where there are categories under which students put vocabulary words that are preselected from the text. This will help students learn the words that they will be seeing in the book and activate their schema.

-During the reading of the text, students can do a Word Scavenger Hunt. This is where students can locate words within the text, or be asked to find objects that represent the vocabulary words that are in the text.  This will help engage student interest and can motivate students.

-After reading the text, students can create a Visual Vocabulary Design (created by Mike Lewis). By doing this, students will learn to think metaphorically by combining pictures with text to abstractly represent their selected vocabulary word. This will encourage them to think critically and strengthen their understanding of the word they choose.

Writing Activity:

-Have students create their own thesaurus! Working in small groups, student can generate a list of vocabulary words to which they can write synonyms or antonyms for. The words can be alphabetized and bound into a book that can be kept in the classroom for reference.