Elementary teachers looking for lesson plans and activities for How to Catch a Monster will find this post helpful. It includes resource recommendations, free teaching ideas, and information about the book. You’ll have everything you need to deliver engaging interactive read aloud lessons based on this story.
With themes of emotions and friendship, this How to Catch a Monster picture book by Adam Wallace is a favorite in 1st, 2nd and 3rd grade classrooms. It will be a big hit in your classroom too! Learn more about this book below!
Engage Your Students with How to Catch a Monster Lesson Plans & Activities in 3 Easy Steps:
- Read a summary of How to Catch a Monster. You can find it in the section below.
- Check out the teaching ideas for reading comprehension strategies, grammar topics and social emotional learning skills that can be taught using this children’s book.
- Download the How to Catch a Monster book companion to make lesson planning simple with How to Catch a Monster reading comprehension questions, writing prompts, teaching ideas & no-prep extension activities.
How to Catch a Monster Summary
Adam Wallace’s story How to Catch a Monster is about a boy who finally has enough courage to try to scare and trap his monster. The boy goes home and puts on his ninja gear and gets ready to scare his monster!
The boy tries many things to scare his monster but not many of them work. Finally, when the monster is trapped, the monster explains that he only scares the boy because he wants him to stay awake to play with him. The monster brings the boy to meet his family and the boy and his monster play and play.
Kids will love this story about how an unlikely friendship develops between a boy and the monster he was trying to catch.
Book Information for Elementary Teachers
What are the reading levels for How to Catch a Monster?
- Lexile® Measure: AD510L
- Guided Reading Level: N
- DRA Level: 24
- Accelerated Reader Level (ARC): 2.7-2.8
Who is the author? Who is the illustrator?
The book was written by Adam Wallace. It was illustrated by Andy Elkerton.
What genre is How to Catch a Monster?
It is a fiction book. You may want to check out our genre activities or read our blog post, How to Teach Genre to Elementary Students.
How many pages are in the book?
The story is 40 pages long.
How to Catch a Monster Lesson Plan Ideas
Each of our 600+ Starts With a Story book companions come with a teacher’s guide to make lesson planning quick and easy, printable worksheets and digital resources that cover ALL of the standards-based reading comprehension skills.
When it comes to writing lesson plans and finding activities for How to Catch a Monster, we’ve already done all of the heavy lifting for you.
We found this book was especially good at teaching the topics listed below.
Reading Comprehension Questions
The text-based How to Catch a Monster reading comprehension questions focus on:
- analyzing character
- rhythm, rhthym, repitition
- summarizing/retelling
Literature-Based Social Emotional Learning Lessons
We found this story to be a great SEL picture book to promote:
- emotions
- friendship
Grammar, Vocabulary & Word Study
- contractions
- exclamatory sentences
- nouns
Get the How to Catch a Monster Book Activities
This How to Catch a Monster Book Companion includes all of the following resources aligned to the story:
- comprehension questions
- 30 writing prompts with themed paper
- vocabulary activities
- word study print & go activities
- ideas for grammar lessons with focus sentence printables
- social emotional learning discussion topics
- graphic organizers to target specific comprehension skills and strategies
One Last Thing Before You Go… Grab this Free Reading Resource!
If you want to get more book ideas to read aloud to your elementary students, then grab this reading freebie for 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade classroom teachers. It includes:
- seasonal read aloud books lists for teachers
- printable reading logs to track students’ reading
- monthly reading challenges to motivate students to read more
It will have you covered for the entire school year, as well as the summer months! Grab this free elementary reading packet now!
