Why should you be teaching with graphic novels? Graphic Novels are fun and engaging for readers and they give students the success of finishing in a book. One of the best things about being a librarian is that you can see the progress of students from K5 through 5th grade. What many teachers do not get to see is this progression of readers. More often than not readers progress from picture books to early readers, then to graphic novels and then to chapter books. This progress takes years.
Graphic novels give the success of finishing a book to all readers. Students who struggle have illustrations to guide their understanding. It is that bridge between picture books and chapter books.
5 Reasons You Should be Teaching with Graphic Novels
Allows for Student Choice
Match student choice with reading levels. Graphic novels range from beginning reader to advance reader and everything in between. Let students marry their choices with your standards.
High Interest
Graphic novels are popular reads these days. Students enjoy sharing and talking about what they are reading and these graphic novels will not spend time sitting on book shelves.
Meeting the Standards
Want to help your students predict, infer, and make connections? Graphic novels are perfect choices for teaching reading standards. Much of what students need to infer is in the pictures and they need to go beyond the text to gain implicit information.
Motivates Kids to Read
Graphic novels are one of the most checked out genres in the library. These are books kids are reading from front to back and read entire series.
Get Started Reading Graphic Novels
Check out this list of amazing graphic novels that will help introduce you to the genre. Please note this post has Amazon Affiliate links.
Graphic Novel Starter Guide for Teachers (and students)
Ready to get started teaching with graphic novels? Here are a few of my favorites. These are ones that you will be able to quickly enjoy and see the value of the stories in graphic novels. You will get so into these stories that you will be turning the pages just as you would with one of your favorite chapter books.
Book Suggestions for Teaching with Graphic Novels
- Wings of Fire
- Cat Wad
- I Survived Series
- Anything Reina Telgemeier
- Babysitter’s Club
- Dog Man
- Max and the Midknights
- Amulet
- Bird and Squirrel
- Sunny Side Up
Share Learning with Writing
Allow students to write their own graphic novels to accompany what they are reading. Book Creator has new updates that allow student
Let go of the “these kids just want to read comics” thoughts. Just as you use picture books to teach strategies, use graphic novels the same way. You can use these reading response task cards to easily guide discussions on graphic novel texts.
Enjoy the process and rather than trying to force chapter books, let student choice drive your instruction.
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