[Georgia Girl]

I have a book that I'm going to use in a first grade classroom in a couple of weeks. This book really lends itself to teaching speech bubbles. Does anyone have any great ideas on how to teach speech bubbles?

Even if your idea is for older kids, I'd love to hear it. I may be able to adapt it in some way. Thanks! GG

[ellenalesa]

Is it the thing in comic strips when a character speaks?

[Tounces]

What is your book? When I use speech bubbles, I like to use pictures of my students (sometimes we get those small sticky-backed photos after picture day). Then I think of a theme for one of my bulletin boards. One year I did Olympics. We studied all of the different sports. The kids chose their favorite sport. Then with their help I changed the bulletin board into a large scene of the Olympics. Kids drew and cut out pictures like big hockey rinks or the ski jump. Then the kids drew themselves doing their favorite sport. They used the photo for their head. Out of their mouths they had drawn speech bubbles. They used a small white piece of construction paper and wrote down what they were saying to someone else at the Olympics. They put these next to their person. Then the whole board ended up with speech bubbles all over it. Kids used quotation marks around the actual words they said. They got to take turns pointing to their person and said what was in their speech bubble.
So you could do the same with any theme. One year they were presidents, another they were astronaunts in space. They liked the picture part of their heads too. That way there was no question about who was who.

[Georgia Girl]

The book is Do Not Open This Book! by Michaela Muntean.

[BookMuncher]

Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus
The Pigeon Finds a Hot dog
and
Don't Let the Pigeon Stay up Late

are my picks for speech bubbles.

[tammych]

I used animal pictures. We were getting ready for a zoo trip.
I chose cute/silly pictures. I gave them the picture and the speech bubble with lines on it. They cut out the animal glued it to paper, drew in a background and added the speech bubble. They were really cute. Everyone stopped on the way past to read them (even my superintendent!)
They wrote things like: Have you seen my banana? (A monkey scratching his head) I don't want to go to school today. (A lion yawning)
I wish I had pictures, but I can't find any.

[KTJM]

When it comes to actually writing the message, I always tell my 3rd graders to do the writing FIRST and then draw the bubble around it. Otherwise, they always seem to draw the bubble too small and the message is hard to read. Kids love to do these. Also, I sometimes use cartoons with no dialogue and have the kids add it in with speech bubbles. I have used the Peanuts characters in the pumpkin patch at Halloween time.

[teacherkathy]

Post Its makes a post it note that is shaped like a speech bubble and my kids love adding these to their pictures and writing the message on them.