I Am an Author

Introduction

• Hold up your short storybook, and read aloud the title and author's name.
• Ask the students if they know what "by" means. Explain that it stands for "written by."
• Let students know that every book is written by an author.
• Point to the illustrations, or pictures, in the book. Explain to the students that the illustrator of a storybook or text creates the pictures in the book.
• Ask students to turn and talk to a partner, explaining how pictures, or illustrations, help us understand what we read.
• Hold up the storybook and nonfiction text. Explain to the students that both fiction (pretend) and nonfiction (books about real things like pandas, cats, and rainforests) have authors.
• Explain to the students that fiction books usually have illustrations, or pictures, and sometimes nonfiction texts do, too. Flip through a few pages of the nonfiction text so students can review the illustrations/photographs.
• Elaborate that many nonfiction books also have photographs because book is about real things!