Groundhog Day Activity - Close Reading Inference Mystery - Missing Groundhog

Groundhog Day Activity - Close Reading Inference Mystery - Kidnapped Groundhog: This missing groundhog close reading inference mystery is a fun way to engage your students and challenge them to look for text evidence, infer information, and read more closely. This Groundhog Day activity includes everything you need to facilitate the mystery in your classroom. 

Groundhog Day is here, and a community anxiously awaits to hear the verdict from Garth, the beloved groundhog, as to whether there will be six more weeks of winter. However, when he fails to emerge from the ground for the annual Groundhog Day ceremony, the event planners realize someone has taken Garth from his underground burrow. Your students need to identify the guilty culprit. This works well around Groundhog Day; however, it can also be used at any point in the year.

Included in this Groundhog Day Activity

➡️ PowerPoint Presentation: This 15-slide PowerPoint presentation guides the mystery with the backstory, evidence, the culprit reveal, and detailed explanations for why each suspect is innocent and why the culprit is guilty.

➡️ “Who Took the Groundhog?” Classroom Poster: Put this poster up on your classroom door or somewhere visible so that when students come in, they are hooked into the activity.

➡️ Original Narrative Backstory: Use this short story to set up and initiate the mystery, with clues hidden within the text!

➡️ A Variety of Clues and Evidence: These require students to close read and use their inference skills. There is a news teleprompter, a blog post, a medical report, a social media post, a scientific research proposal, a building permit application form, an email, and a text message.

➡️ “Who Took the Groundhog” Graphic Organizer: Students can use this to keep track of their findings that support or refute different suspects in the mystery.

➡️ Teacher Answer Key: This is made available in print format and within the presentation slideshow to make reviewing students’ work a breeze.

How This Groundhog Day Activity Works:

• S tart by putting up the poster on your door to build anticipation when students enter the room. When students enter, put them in small groups, so they can work together to try to solve the mystery.
• U se the presentation slides to guide you through each element of the lesson. The slides will help you introduce the story and evidence to each of the groups.
• H and out all the evidence to students and allow them time to make their predictions and inferences and solve the mystery.
• O nce each group has made their final prediction, use the presentation slides to reveal the culprit and go through each of the suspects to show the evidence of their innocence or guilt. This Groundhog Day activity will engage all your students!
  
  

What Teachers Are Saying About This Groundhog Day Activity

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ I cannot say enough how much they loved this activity! We created case files and they worked in small groups to figure out the mystery. They loved the BIG reveal the next day!

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ This is by far the best resource I've purchased this school year! It was fun, engaging, and rigorous. My students were able to work with relevant academic content in a unique way.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ This was GREAT! My students worked in pairs to solve the mystery and engagement was through the roof. When the culprit was revealed in the end, they were all shocked. We loved it.

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