The Candy Conspiracy

Written By: Carrie Snyder

Illustrated By: Claudia Dvila

Content Objective:
Core Standard for First Grade Language Arts:
Reading - Literature Standard 1: Ask and answer questions about key details in a text.
Reading - Literature Standard 3: Describe characters, settings, and major events in a story,
using key details.

Student Learning Outcomes:

The students will be able to understand the story of The Candy Conspiracy and use it to
improve their writing by identifying different rhetorical devices, mimicking sentences from the
book, and identifying vocabulary words from the book that they do not know and learn what they
mean.
Length of Lesson: 40 Minutes

Equipment and Materials Needed:

Flash Cards- 3x5
Book: The Candy Conspiracy A Tale of Sweet Victory by Carrie Snyder
Computer and Projector to show pictures of the book while telling the story
PowerPoint Presentation on Rhetorical Devices
Personal white boards with dry erase markers and erasers
Paper
Dictionaries (for each table, or for multiple students to share)

Behavior Expectations:
The children need to listen to the story, follow instructions when using the whiteboards, be
attentive during the slideshow, be good at sharing the dictionaries, and be willing to write down
3-5 definitions on their flashcards.

Experience / Identify
Before the students enter, place a white board with a marker/eraser, one sheet of paper, and 3-
5 3x5 flashcards on their desks. Place a dictionary at each table, or distribute them evenly
throughout the classroom. Have the book cover of The Candy Conspiracy projected on the
board so the student will hopefully become excited. Tell the students to listen to the full story the
first time through, and pay attention to words they do not know and write them down, and
certain parts of the story they like (to mimic in their writing later). Begin reading story.

Explore / Investigate
After reading the story, tell students to take out their 3x5 notecards and spread them out on their
desks. Have them write a word they did not know from the story on one side of each flash card,
and have them look up each word in their dictionaries and write down the definitions on the
other side of the flashcard. Have the students share their words and definitions in groups.
Next, tell students to take out their whiteboards and markers. Ask students which part of the
story they liked best, and flip to that page of the book. Do this three times. At each page, have
all the students rewrite the sentence in their own words and in their own style, but still mimicking
the way the author does it, on their whiteboard. Ask students who want to share to read to the
class the sentences they rewrote, so they can learn from the different sentences.

To conclude the lesson, have students turn their attention to your powerpoint presentation. This
powerpoint will contain the different rhetorical devices from The Candy Conspiracy. Include
rhetorical questions, onomatopoeia, anaphoras, personification, and whatever other rhetorical
devices the teacher sees fit. Use examples from the book that apply to each of the devices to
give the students an understanding of what each is.