Fall Themed Picture Books for Upper Elementary

Fall is truly my favorite time of the year, and I also love finding simple ways to celebrate fall in the classroom. One easy way this can be done is by reading fall themed picture books to your students and incorporating them into your lessons. There are many wonderful fall themed picture books, but I wanted to share a few of my favorites that are great for upper elementary.

The Stranger

I absolutely love all of Chris Van Allsburg's picture books. Not only are the stories fun and interesting and the illustrations are just amazing, but many wonderful reading lessons for upper elementary can be developed and discussed with his picture books. The Stranger is definitely one of these picture books that is perfect for the upper elementary reading class. Students will be captivated by the story of this mysterious stranger who seems to have lost his memory after Mr. Bailey accidentally hits him with his truck. The Baileys take in the stranger and help him while he recovers. This book is ideal for teaching and modeling inferences. Several inferences can be made about the stranger by the subtle and unusual occurrences that take place at the Bailey's home. The Stranger is filled with many teaching opportunities for higher order thinking skills. For example, lessons can be modeled and discussed for change in character, the importance of setting to a story, and how changing the setting (time of year) might change the book just to name a few. This book is definitely at the top of my fall reading list!

Hello, Harvest Moon

Hello, Harvest Moon is another great picture book for upper elementary. Even though at first glance this book may seem too easy and simple for upper grade students, many in depth lessons and discussions can come from this beautifully written book. Hello, Harvest Moon is filled with wonderful poetic language, metaphors, personification, and alliteration which make it a great model text for studying figurative language and poetic language. There are many excellent teaching points in this book! Be sure to read this one to your students this fall. They will love it!

The Lonely Scarecrow

I'll admit that the reading level of this picture book is slightly lower, but this sweet story about a lonely scarecrow can be the starting point to a variety of lessons including character education, kindness, and how to treat others. Lonely Scarecrow can also be used to teach personification, metaphors, alliteration, adjectives, vivid verbs, author's word choice, and theme. This little book is can be used with a variety of lessons. I have personally used this book for many years, and my students have always enjoyed it.

Scarecrow

When I think of fall, I think of scarecrows, so it is not surprising that I have another book about scarecrows on my favorites list. Scarecrow by Cynthia Rylant is a beautifully illustrated book that is perfect to read aloud and enjoy this fall. Personification as well as similes can be modeled and discussed in this read aloud. Sometimes it is just nice to enjoy a book, and this one can be simply enjoyed, or use it as a spring board to introduce a fun fall writing activity or a fun fall scarecrow art project. Just be creative!

Spiders

My last book suggestion is a fabulous nonfiction book by Seymour Simon. Your students will be fascinated by the fun facts and photos about spiders found in this wonderful book.  I have used this book when teaching cause and effect. There is no need to read the entire book for this activity. Simply pull a few pages or paragraphs from this book for a great lesson. For more ideas read my blog post HERE.

A great activity to use with any of the books above would be my fun Acorn Flipbooks (pictured above). Use these easy flipbooks with nonfiction books such as Spiders. Two versions of a fiction flipbook are also included in this packet that would be perfect to use with the fiction books on my favorites list or with any of your favorite books or stories. Fall Acorn Fiction and Nonfiction Flipbooks are a creative way to incorporate some fall fun with almost any book or story. When I created these acorn flipbooks, I was looking for a fun way for my students to reflect on and write about their reading. I knew that my students enjoyed flipbooks, so I decided to create this fun acorn shaped flipbook in which students could write about almost any fiction book (character, setting, problem, and solution) or write about nonfiction (vocabulary, cause/effect, details, and text features). I also wanted a fun way to display the students' work, so my "We're Nuts About Reading" bulletin board was created. The three versions of the acorn flipbook as well as letters and ideas to create the bulletin board can all be found in the link in the picture below. My students loved this activity, and yours will too! Check them out below and simply click on the picture for the link.

Even upper elementary students still love picture books. I hope you found a book and perhaps and idea or two that you will enjoy using with your class this fall! Thanks for visiting and be blessed!