My Shadow is Pink: Teaching Notes

My Shadow is Pink is a gorgeous rhyming book that explores identity and diversity. The little boy loves to dance and play with dolls and initially is frustrated by this. He talks about how his shadow is pink but his Dads is burly blue.

After reading this with my class in 2022, we did a great lesson around gender stereotypes and our own personal shadows.

My Shadow is Pink Lesson Plan

Tuning In:

Start with the front cover, what do you notice? What interests you? What are you wondering? Open questions like this can really start great discussion amongst your students. Keep in mind, I did this with a Prep (Kindergarten class) but these questions are suitable for any age group. Some other questions may be:

• How do you think the character feels about his shadow?
• What colour do you think your shadow is?

From here, I would read the book. Personally, I like to read a text like this all the way through first rather than stopping and chatting about different parts on the first read. I find that the story can be come disjointed if you are stopping to have conversation and the comprehension may get skewed. It is also nice for the children to just be completely sucked in by the story before unpacking it!

Discuss:

After reading the text, you might like to ask the students what they thought of the book? Did your ideas about the book change throughout? How did you feel throughout the text?

Based on the age group you are working with, you may want to ask different questions. Whilst this is a picture book, there are plenty learning opportunities for all Primary School students within the text. Below I have outlined the questions I may as each year level group to spark the conversation amongst the class.

Foundation – 2:

• What toys do you think are considered “just for boys”? What about “just for girls”?
• What about colours? Are there colours specifically for boys and girls?
• What do you think about this?
• How does the boy feel about his shadow at the beginning of the book?
• Why does the class look at the boy when he arrives at school?
• How does he feel about his shadow when he goes to school?
• What makes the boy feel better at the end of the story?

Grade 3 – 6:

• How is life different for the boy in the story?
• Why does the boy think that there is something wrong with him?
• What does dad mean by “it’s just a phase”?
• Dad is worried that he wants to wear a dress to school. Why?
• What does the boy find out about the members of his family? Why didn’t he know this before?
• What happens if we all keep our shadows a secret?
• Why do you think people do keep their shadows a secret?
• Should we change this?
• What does it mean to fit in?
• Should we be trying to make everyone in our community fit in?

Activity:

Hopefully, you’ve chosen a SUNNY day to learn from this beautiful book and can head outside for the next part of the lesson.

What you will need:

• chalk
• device for photos

Have the students partner up and head out to a concreted area in your school. One student strikes a pose – this may be a pose that reflects their personality or simply just standing there. They need to make sure that the sun is behind them so that their pose casts a shadow onto the concrete. Their partner then traces around their shadow with chalk in a colour of their choice. The student posing can then draw inside their shadow some of the things that they like. Be sure to swap over and draw for the other partner too.

Take photos of each student with their shadow so that they can use this as a writing prompt when you return to the classroom or in your next lesson.

Writing Response:

Upon returning to the classroom, you might like to show your students the animated version of the story. You can watch it here – My Shadow is Pink YouTube.

Discuss this things that the students like that may or may not be the same as their peers. Ask the question “What makes you special or unique?”.

Students then need to choose a colour that they think represents them. They begin their writing with “My Shadow is [insert colour here] because…” and then share all of the reasons why their shadow is that colour and what makes them special. Bless one of my Preppies, she had the most beautiful things to share – see picture below.

My Shadow is Pink PDF

Click the image to download the template for the writing response.

I hope that this book fills your classroom with as much joy and gratitude as it did mine. Hopefully the teaching thoughts and ideas are a starting point for you on how you would use this book in your own lesson. Please comment below if you have any thoughts or ideas that I can add to these!

Happy Teaching x