This product is for printables with a complete key for the novel The Crossover by Kwame Alexander. The printables include, but are not limited to analyzing the physical text, identifying character traits, exploring figurative language, citing text based details, identifying and explaining poetic elements, compare/contrast, finding the main idea, expanding vocabulary, making text connections and seeking author’s purpose. There is also a complete key included with answers and/or suggested answers. It is the greatest young adult book to teach in a middle school classroom.

To assess the quality of my work, please click here for a free sample of “Warm-up” Warm-up: A FREE PRODUCT This product is for a three page printable for the first section of The Crossover: Warm-up. The handout specifically focuses on studying the physical textual layout of a piece and how that contributes to the chapter as a whole, citing textual evidence, identifying and explaining the author’s use of poetic elements and figurative language and making personal text connections. If you like this free sample, please follow my store as I roll out ALL the materials you need to teach this fabulous novel.

This also includes the “Skills to Know”, “Question Types” and “Figurative Language Terms” which are covered in the ENTIRE unit. All of these skills are not covered in the Warm-up, just as a heads-up. But, this will show you the quality of my work and what you can expect throughout the entire unit.

Follow my store for the complete unit for The Crossover. It’s AWESOME! In includes an entire week of interactive pre-reading activities, printables for the entire book, nonfiction and poetry connections and assessments. There is also a literature circle unit which can be used in addition to the novel available. Click here for a FREE sample of the text based vocabulary development.

First Quarter:

This is a 5 page .pdf file with a complete key. These activities directly correspond with the first quarter of The Crossover and include, but are not limited to, activities in:

Analysis of physical text
Reading comprehension
Discovering author’s purpose
Identifying and exploring figurative language
Establishing how parts of a text contribute to the text as a whole
Writing and answering questions
Labeling parts of speech: adjectives and verbs
Literature based vocabulary development

Second Quarter:

This is a 5 page .pdf file with a complete key. These activities directly correspond with the second quarter of The Crossover and include, but are not limited to, activities in:

Citing text based details
Reading comprehension
Parts of speech
Identifying and exploring figurative language
Foreshadowing and irony
Writing and answering questions
Point of view
Literature based vocabulary development

Third Quarter:

This is a 5 page .pdf file with a complete key. These activities directly correspond with the third quarter of The Crossover and include, but are not limited to, activities in:

Analysis of physical text
Reading comprehension
Tone and cliffhanger
Identifying and exploring figurative language
Reviewing poetic elements
Writing and answering questions
Theme – maturity
Literature based vocabulary development

Fourth Quarter:

This is a 4 page .pdf file with a complete key. These activities directly correspond with the fourth quarter of The Crossover and include, but are not limited to, activities in:

Analysis of physical text
Reading comprehension, recall, and analysis
How an author’s word choice effects text as a whole
Identifying, reviewing, analyzing and exploring figurative language
repetition
Writing and answering questions
Mood vs. tone
Literature based and independent vocabulary development
Close reading

Overtime:

This is a 2 page .pdf file with a complete key. These activities directly correspond with Overtime in The Crossover and include, but are not limited to, activities in:

Text analysis
How an author’s word choice effects text as a whole: “crossover”
Identifying, reviewing, analyzing and exploring figurative language
Parts of speech
Literature based vocabulary development

Assessments:

This is a .zip file containing 2 assessments for the novel The Crossover by Kwame Alexander. The first assessment is 25 questions and corresponds with the first and second quarters. The second assessment is 30 questions and this is a formative assessment of the novel. Each assessment has a complete answer key with the correct answers highlighted. It also includes a blank answer sheet with a key.

There are a number of basic recall questions in each assessment. In addition, there are specific questions related to the following:

protagonist
setting
figurative language
pace
point-of-view
characterization
chronological order
vocabulary
author’s style
how lines/words contribute to the text as a whole
foreshadowing
theme

These assessments can work independently, but work best when paired with The Crossover Printables and Chapter Activities.

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“The Crossover” Writing Prompts

Posted on November 7, 2019November 7, 2019 by educationisland

Writing Journal prompts – The Crossover

The writing prompts are ideally used as a companion to “The Crossover” by Kwame Alexander. They are inspired from his book, “The Playlist”. I used these in my seventh grade class as a writing reflection to the book, “The Crossover”, which we read together as a read aloud in class. There are 27 slides total in this product in the form of a PDF files which can be used in a PowerPoint or Google Slideshow presentation.

The first two prompts coincide with pre-reading activities. The first is a narrative piece where the students would create a story prediction. The second writing prompt is a reflection on “The Rose that Grew from Concrete”. This is a poem by Tupac Shakur which can be used as a pre-reading activity for “The Crossover”. If you’d like to see this unit in its entirety, please click here.

Then, to end each section of the book, Warm-up, First Quarter, Second Quarter, Third Quarter, Fourth Quarter and Overtime, there is an opportunity for a writing response based on some character trait in the novel. These prompts were inspired from Kwame Alexander’s book, “The Playbook”. Each prompt asks students to reflect on a character trait (focus, determination, grit, “the rules”, motivation, passion, teamwork and tenacity). Then, there is a slide with famous quotations to correspond with the character trait. Students are instructed to choose one quotation to cut out and paste in their writing journal. It makes it more of an interactive notebook.

If you are interested in more lessons from “The Crossover”, please follow my TpT store. I read this book as a read aloud with my seventh grade students and they absolutely loved it.

“The Crossover” Extension Activities

Posted on November 5, 2019November 5, 2019 by educationisland

“The Crossover” by Kwame Alexander is the newest, greatest book to use as a teaching resource in middle school. This year I taught this book with my seventh grade students and all the kids absolutely loved it! I’m currently working on uploading all my resources, so follow my TpT store. There are FREE samples of certain products and more will be uploaded! This blog describes some of the extension activities I used with the students: Nonfiction Connections and Writing Response Journal.

Nonfiction Connections

For these two lessons, I used “The Playbook” by Kwame Alexander as a text connection.

To begin, I give the students 6 and 8 laminated slides with various quotations and images on them. I use Inductive Learning to allow the students to observe and categorize the images. I used this helpful YouTube video as inspiration.

I created two nonfiction texts based from excerpts in the book. They are both mini-biographies: The first is about Péle and second is about LeBron James. Both biographies instruct students to annotate and answer higher level thinking questions about the text. Then, each biography displays a character trait: Focus and Determination. The students are given a writing prompt to complete a journal entry about each quality. They are also given quotations and photographs to make their journals interactive.

Writing Response Journals

Here, I created a PowerPoint presentation focusing on a variety of characteristics that it takes to make a person successful. Again, I used “The Playbook” by Kwame Alexander as the inspiration for this assignment. The students are given 9 writing prompts dealing with the traits of “Focus, Determination, Grit….” Then, they are given quotations to cut out and use as an interactive notebook. I paired this activity with my nonfiction connections as well. The students enjoyed writing in their journals and making real-life connections between the text and their lives. In its entirety, the product has a 26 PowerPoint presentation or 26 .png files.