City of Ember

I love doing a novel study with my class each term.
There are so many awesome novels and activities available to get students excited for reading.
When I choose a novel study I try to choose a novel that is part of a series, this in hope that students will be so excited at the end of the novel they want to read on. I also look for novels that come with a movie, this is a great incentive for students who are less motivated than others to keep up with the work.

This term I chose 'City of Ember'. I chose this after stumbling across Runde's Room and seeing what an amazing job she was doing with the novel. Our term focus is currently 'Forensics' although this book doesn't have fingerprinting or DNA evidence, it does have the element of mystery. The students have been cracking codes, deciphering clues, predicting and analysing the chapters in the text to find a way out of Ember. This is a fantastic book and my class is extremely engaged.

 I  used Teachers Pay Teachers to gain as many free resources as I could for the novel. I did end up purchasing a few resources that I would definitely recommend:

Literary Question Fans
Story Elements Question Fans
Paper Bag Character Study
City of Ember the Complete Unit


After seeing Runde's Room blog posts about 'City of Ember' I was so excited I had to hitchhike off of her ideas! On her blog she had created a 3D mural - Click here to check it out - I showed this to my class and they were excited to get started. As a class we decided on what the most important elements are for the setting. Then we rolled a dice and students were assigned jobs. As I read the novel students began designing their elements straight away.

I am very excited to see and share the final product!

Designs will be 3D and added to this wall. Students have buildings and other elements of setting for below Ember, Ember and above Ember. 

Students roles and a timeline of when the mural is expected to be completed.

Literary Questions Fans

Story Elements Question Fans

Main Learning Intention for the novel

Students have been keeping a record of important events and locations in the novel by colour coding a map of Ember

One students design of the generator from the novel