Elementary teachers looking for lesson plans and activities for Shanté Keys and the New Year’s Peas 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 individuality, this Shanté Keys and the New Year’s Peas picture book by Gail Piernas-Davenport 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 Shanté Keys and the New Year’s Peas Lesson Plans & Activities in 3 Easy Steps:
- Read a summary of Shanté Keys and the New Year’s Peas. 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 book companion to make lesson planning simple with Shanté Keys and the New Year’s Peas reading comprehension questions, writing prompts, teaching ideas & no-prep extension activities.
SHANTÉ KEYS AND THE NEW YEAR'S PEAS SUMMARY
It is New Years and Shanté Keys and her family are having a special dinner. They always have black-eyed peas on New Year’s for good luck, but Shanté Keys grandmother forgot them. Shanté Keys is sent out to ask neighbors and friends if they have any.
First, Shanté Keys asked her neighbor Miss Lee for peas. Miss Lee explains that she is Chinese and makes dumplings for New Years. Shanté Keys thanks Miss Lee and invites her to dinner before heading to Mr. MacGhee’s. While at the grocer, Shanté learns that Mr. MacGhee is Scottish and celebrates New Year by eating haggis and cheese. She invites Mr. MacGhee to dinner to try peas and goes to see Senor Ortiz.
Senor Ortiz does not have peas, but he explains to Shanté Key that he is from Mexico and celebrates New Year’s by eating grapes. Again, Shanté invites her friend to dinner that night. Next Shanté Key’s heads to her friend Hari’s looking for peas. Hari is Hindu and celebrates Diwali instead. Shante invites her over to try peas that night. She is becoming frantic because no one has peas. That’s when she decides to ask her Aunt Marie. Thankfully Aunt Marie has plenty of peas to spare.
Shanté Key’s heads home to help her family prepare for dinner. All of her neighbors and friends come to try the New Year’s peas.
Students will love learning about the different New Year’s traditions discussed in this book.
SHANTÉ KEYS AND THE NEW YEAR’S PEAS LESSON PLAN IDEAS
Each of our 400+ 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 Shanté Keys and the New Year’s Peas, 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 Shanté Keys and the New Year’s Peas reading comprehension questions focus on:
- author’s purpose
- cause and effect
- comparing and contrasting
- rhyme, rhythm, repetition
- sequencing
LITERATURE-BASED SOCIAL EMOTIONAL LEARNING LESSONS
We found this story to be a great SEL picture book to promote:
- individuality
GRAMMAR, VOCABULARY & WORD STUDY
- plural nouns
- possessive nouns
- irregular verbs
- types of sentences
SHANTÉ KEYS AND THE NEW YEAR’S PEAS ACTIVITIES
You’ll receive 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
YOU HAVE 2 OPTIONS! WHERE WOULD YOU LIKE TO PURCHASE THIS BOOK COMPANION?
BOOK INFO FOR ELEMENTARY TEACHERS
What are the reading levels for Shanté Keys and the New Year’s Peas?
- Lexile® Measure: N/A
- Guided Reading Level: N/A
- DRA Level: N/A
- Accelerated Reader Level (ARC): N/A
Who is the author? Who is the illustrator?
The book was written by Gail Piernas-Davenport. It was illustrated by Marion Eldridge.
What genre is Shanté Keys and the New Year’s Peas?
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 32 pages long.
