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This video was so helpful, and you could show this video specifically to your class, or create it in your own personalized way. You could make this video into a whole lesson on teaching theme in the classroom. It clarifies so much and could help students understand what theme is and how to determine it from anything!

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The only way you will ever need to teach theme

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This website is a great way for teachers to understand where their students are coming from and where they stand. This also gives tips for teachers to help their students determine the overall theme. This source is important for teachers and can help them in their classroom.

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When students in Becca Morris's class start listening to R.J. Palacio's she looks forward to the discussion it will inspire, with questions like What does it mean to be a true friend? What's the role of the bystander in bullying situations? and Can we tell what a person is like just by looking at them? anchoring the conversation. It is conversations like these that facilitate teaching theme in language arts. And the answers can turn reading a book into a life-changing experience for young learners.

"Studying themes like trust, integrity, and honesty," says Rachel Claff, editorial director for the Great Books Foundation, "builds thoughtful world citizens and friends, the kinds of thinkers you want to have in your classroom."

Each time students read, they're entering into a conversation with the author about what matters, says Jeffrey Wilhelm, distinguished professor at Boise State University and author of Fresh Takes on Teaching Literary Elements. At the core of that conversation, however, is comprehension. To fully explore theme, students must understand what they read and then extract ideas from the text. "You can't think with ideas unless you understand them," says Wilhelm.

Here are 14 tips to help your students understand theme as they read.

1. Meet your students where they are.

Plan reading and discussion around questions that your students are already grappling with, from What does it mean to be a good friend? to What is heroism?

When you connect your literature themes to character development and what's going on in students' lives, your discussions will hopefully resonate deeply with them. One goal with teaching theme, explains Jodi Libretti of the Great Books Foundation, is to encourage students "not only to think about ways that they can live, but the type of person they want to become."

2. Start with concrete details.

Before they can identify and work with the theme of a story, your students need to have a strong grasp of the details: setting, character, plot. When they work with theme, they have to synthesize all that information into an overarching message. Use anchor charts to outline the elements of the story or give students a graphic organizer to follow.

3. Clarify the difference between theme and main idea.

Source: Mrs. Smith in 5th

Many students have difficulty differentiating between the main idea and the theme. The theme is the underlying message that the author wants to convey, whereas the main idea is what the story is mostly about. Teach these concepts separately and together. You might practice identifying themes and main ideas using Disney films or the stories your students read last year in order to have a common reference point. After you review as a class, give students a list of themes and main ideas and challenge them to work in pairs to create matches.

4. Scaffold the learning.

Theme is a difficult concept to grasp. Unlike the concreteness of setting or plot, theme is subtle and subjective. Move from simpler to more complex class assignments to help your students deepen their understanding. Humanities teachers Sara Kaviar and Megan O'Keefe, of the Wildwood School in Los Angeles, invite their students to work in groups to identify the theme of a fairy tale. Next, they create different endings to the tale and work together to identify how the new ending affects the theme. Finally, students write their own plots to match a given theme. Watch a video of how they approach teaching theme here.

5. Use essential questions.

Source: Creating Readers & Writers

Essential questions are open-ended, thought-provoking, and important in helping students develop their understanding of the theme. Questions like Why do people behave honestly? and What makes a good friend? are ones that you can return to throughout the year to analyze how students answer. See how their answers change as you read different authors' takes on the subject.

6. Ask story-specific questions, too.

Specific, targeted questions help focus students on the text. "Asking 'what is the theme?' sometimes strands students because it's too general," says Claff. On the other hand, asking questions that are more explicit, like "Where does friendship play an important part in this story?" can be too leading. Instead, ask questions that draw from the text and require evidence to support theme. For example, if you're reading Tuck Everlasting, you might ask, "Should Winnie drink the immortality water?"

7. Approach theme from different directions.

Be ready to phrase questions about theme a few different ways because you never know which question(s) will resonate with students. Some questions that will encourage thinking about theme are: What did the author want us to think about? What idea stays with you? and What will you remember about the story a year from now?

8. Accept a range of answers.

Of course, for many texts, there are often multiple themes and more than one way to express them. Be flexible when accepting students' answers to theme-based questions. Students will often be grappling with concepts they can't fully own. For example, if a student says the theme of Tuck Everlasting is living forever is a bad idea, you can work with the class to find different ways to express this thought. You might say, "Okay, what are some other ways we can say that?" Guide students toward the theme rather than requiring one right answer, which can turn the discussion into a game of guessing the teacher's thoughts.

9. Allow students to disagree with the theme.

Let students know that they don't have to agree with the theme, just because they read it! Showcase two opposing themes and have students discuss which one they agree with more. For example, you could have a paragraph with the theme of You can always trust your friends and another paragraph with the theme of If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.

10. Get away from the obvious.

It's easy to tease out the theme from some stories (think: Aesop's The Ant and the Grasshopper). Challenge students with stories that don't follow a typical pattern. For example, in the Great Books unit on honesty, students read about characters who begin each story by being dishonest. By starting with a character who's lying, students explore deeper issues of honesty from the start. The careful use of stories, says Claff, opens up issues for students in an interesting real-world way.

11. Connect your discussions to other subject areas.

Do you see examples in social studies or current events that connect to your theme? Start a collection or bulletin board around your current literature theme. Students can add examples from pop culture, history, or other reading. Help students connect the theme to their own lives by assigning take-home activities that build personal experiences around each theme. When students study kindness in Great Books, they perform a random act of kindness. And when third graders study gratitude, they give an anonymous gift so they can experience what it's like to not receive a thank-you.

12. Provide a range of reading options.

To engage students at varying reading levels, provide a selection of books on one theme. When teacher and author Laura Robb teaches about obstacles, she fills her classroom library with biographies so students can read about how different historical figures overcame challenges in their lives. Even when each student is reading something different, they are still engaging with the theme in conferences and writing. One way to introduce choice is to have a read-aloud anchor text for all students, with a variety of stories to choose from for independent reading. In conferences, ask students to relate and connect their independent reading to the read aloud.

Teaching theme gets at the heart of what we want for students-authentic, meaningful, and memorable experiences with text. Jeff Wilhelm may have put it best, "If you can read for theme, you can participate in a democracy."

13. Use mini lessons to drive the point home.

These seven quick mini-lessons help for teaching theme and how authors and artists extract a big idea.

Read inspirational words to define a theme and brainstorm stories, movies, or real-life events in which you see this theme played out.

2. View compelling art.

Make art a springboard to discuss themes and how they're interpreted. For example, Edvard Munch's The Scream can inspire a discussion about the theme of fear and uncertainty.

3. Listen to songs.

Songs can lend themselves to a discussion of how artists communicate larger messages through lyrics. For instance, Lee Ann Womack's "I Hope You Dance" lends itself to a discussion of independence.

4. Pull out the oldies but goodies.

Fairy tales are quick hits in teaching theme-like pulling the theme of envy from Snow White.

5. Review popular movies.

Brainstorm theme ideas from popular movies. For example, The Lion King and responsibility or Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory and greed.

6. Watch a Pixar short

Pixar shorts are easily found on YouTube. You can watch them as a class and then hone in on a theme discussion. Consider Piper, Partly Cloudy, and Lava.

7. Judge some books by their cover.

Post the covers of books you have read and ask students to discuss whether or not the theme is evident on the cover.

14. Continue to assess theme throughout the year.

As the year progresses, you'll want to know if teaching theme paid off and if students are able to identify theme independently. Here are eight suggestions for finding out if your students are getting it.

1. Use annotation.

Have students annotate a text with details, quotes, and other "golden lines" that highlight the theme. Save and print our free teacher and student infographic posters on annotation.

2. Monitor reader responses.

Writing responses to the essential questions from the start to finish of a unit will help you see how students develop their ideas.

3. Map character growth.

Oftentimes theme comes from the way characters-usually the main character-changes and grows throughout the story. Have students create a growth chart focused on one character, that marks transitions in their development.

4. Compare the theme with that of other stories.

Connecting the theme from one story to another shows that students grasp the theme in a broad sense.

5. Cite evidence.

Ask your students to give concrete examples from the book that demonstrate the theme. This can include quotes, summaries, or title headings, to name just a few.

6. Reflect.

Have students make a connection through writing and discussion on what the theme means to them personally and how their understanding of the theme has changed based on their reading.

7. Search for additional themes.

Many stories have more than just one theme-sometimes, you just have to dig a little. Using a story that students are familiar with, have them identify and support a theme that's different than the one you've already studied. For example, in the story Oliver Button, students may come up with themes of bullying, gender roles, and determination.

8. Listen for theme.

In reading conferences with students, train yourself to listen for specific details and examples about theme. The more students are understanding, the better they'll be at answering questions like What does the author want you to remember?

What are your tips for teaching theme? Come and share in our WeAreTeachers HELPLINE group on Facebook.

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14 Essential Tips for Teaching Theme in Language Arts

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When students in Becca Morris's class start listening to R.J. Palacio's she looks forward to the discussion it will inspire, with questions like What does it mean to be a true friend? What's the role of the bystander in bullying situations? and Can we tell what a person is like just by looking at them?

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This is an interactive activity on BrainPop. I played this game, and had so much fun. I know my students would have fun playing this game as well. This interactive activity helps students determine the theme of the sentence and allows you to submit your answers. After you submit your answers, the other players present their answers too and you chose which one is the best. If you still agree with your choice you can still chose that one or another answer. This source can be used for so many games and activities but I used mine for theme.

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This is a video on how to teach theme inside the classroom. These teachers work together in a co-teacher classroom to help their students determine theme through worksheets and interactive activities. They present fairy-tales and other stories to the class and they determine the overall theme!

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Common core State Standards

ELA: English Language Arts

RL: Reading Standards for Literature 6-12

7: 7th Grade

2:
Determine a theme or central idea of a text and
analyze its development over the course of the
text; provide an objective summary of the text.

Download Common Core State Standards (PDF 1.2 MB)

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Common core State Standards

ELA: English Language Arts

RL: Reading Standards for Literature 6-12

8: 8th Grade

2:
Determine a theme or central idea of a text and
analyze its development over the course of the text,
including its relationship to the characters, setting,
and plot; provide an objective summary of the text.

Download Common Core State Standards (PDF 1.2 MB)

Thought starters

1. How does the story of the Three Little Pigs help students understand that themes can vary?

2. See how a change to the end of a story alters the theme. How does writing their own plot based on a given theme deepen understanding?

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Humanities teachers Megan O'Keefe and Sarah Kaviar teach a lesson on theme to their 7th and 8th grade students. Students first work in groups matching themes to quotations. The quotations, or excerpts, are carefully selected to include several clues about the theme so that students feel comfortable and confident.

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I would use this in my English Language Arts classroom, because there are many words on this that describes summer. All of these words centralize the idea that all of these things are used in summer or you and your friends or family do this during summer. I think this would be so helpful for students, because it's not too overwhelming and shows the theme.

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This is a chart that is very colorful and easy to read. I found this and thought it would be useful for readers, teachers, and students.

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Grasping the idea of theme can be challenging. This website can help teachers and individuals on the true messages throughout the piece of work. Scholastic is always a helpful resource.

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Finding The Message: Grasping Themes in Literature | Scholastic

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How to teach theme in the upper grades, including SMART Notebook files (also in PDF form), a project idea, and printable graphic organizers and posters.

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This is a PDF I found that can help students or teachers on how to determine theme. This could be written down on poster board and placed in the classroom for short tips.

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Finding a theme in a story can be confusing for students. They might think that the plot is the theme; however, this video explains how to determine the theme rather than the plot. This is an often mistake students make, so making sure that they understand the differences can be helpful.

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This is a worksheet that I would give to my students, because I think it gives a lot of direction and clarity on this specific sheet. I think this can help students determine the main theme of a book or movie in English Language Arts