Illustration introducing the characters: Malik, Ben, Zoey, and Mr. Dobbs
Shannon Wright
Mini Graphic Novel,

Pine School Pals: The Secret

Meet the Pine School second-grade class. Today Malik shares a secret with Ben, but that causes a big problem. 

By Lindsey Owen
From the February 2024 Issue

Children will practice finding the problem and solution in a fiction story.

Lexile® measure: 370L
Featured Skill: Use Visuals, Main Idea,
Topic: Social-emotional learning,
Common Core Standards
  • RL.2.1 Key details RL.2.3 Describe how characters respond to events RL.2.5 Story structure RL.2.7 Use information from illustrations to understand characters, setting, and plot RL.2.10 Read grade-2-appropriate stories SL.2 Participate in conversations about grade-2 texts
TEKS Standards
  • Health
    (3) Mental health and wellness—social and emotional health. The student identifies and applies strategies to develop socio-emotional health, self-regulation, and healthy relationships. The student is expected to: (C) discuss and explain how thoughts and emotions are related; (D) explain the effect of peer influence on an individual’s social and emotional health; (E) describe the qualities of a good friend; (G) identify the feelings and perspectives of others by interpreting their verbal and nonverbal cues (4) Mental health and wellness—developing a healthy self-concept. The student develops the capacity for self-assessment and evaluation, goal setting, and decision making in order to develop a healthy self-concept. The student is expected to: (A) discuss ways to be kind to self and others

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Pine School Pals: The Secret

By Lindsey Owen

video (1)
Activities (3)
Skills Activities
Answer Key (1)
video (1)
Activities (3) Download All Quizzes and Activities
Skills Activities
Answer Key (1)

About the Story

Social and Life Skills

Resolving conflicts constructively

Step-by-Step Lesson Plan
Download the Lesson Plan

Implementation

  • Small group; whole group; independent reading

Pairings and Text Connections

  • From the Storyworks 2 archive:

This comic is part of a series. Students can look at past print issues or go online to read about the Pine School Pals’ other adventures!

Before-Reading Resources

  • Text Preview Bookmarks

(10 minutes) Kids can cut out the fiction bookmark and use it to preview the text.

Suggested Reading Focus

Read as a play, problem/solution (30 minutes)

 

  • Read the first page with your students. You can assign students different roles and read this mini graphic novel aloud like a short play! The main characters are introduced on the first page.
  • As you read, ask students to think about what the problem is. Then, when you have finished reading, ask what solution the characters found.

After-Reading Skills Practice

(15 minutes for each activity)

  • Problem and Solution: This activity helps students reflect on the structure of the comic they have just read.
  • Comics Feature Hunt: This activity helps students identify features of comics.

Be sure to check out our “What's in a Comic?” video! This fun video helps kids understand features of comics, like speech bubbles, thought bubbles, and more.

Text-to-Speech