The Romance of a Busy Broker by O Henry Short Story Unit Reading Guide

Item description

Looking for a fun and engaging way to introduce your students to O. Henry’s The Romance of the Busy Broker? Look no further than this complete short story unit! Students will love delving into this classic tale of romance, while simultaneously building important reading skills.

This comprehensive unit includes everything you need to get started, including a detailed reading guide, questioning prompts, graphic organizers, and more. Plus, it’s easily adaptable for whole class or small group instruction, independent work, or enrichment activities. No matter how you use it, your students are sure to develop a deeper understanding of the text – and have a blast doing it!

Author Study

At the beginning of the activity is a short paragraph that is intended to introduce the student to the author.

Pre-reading activity

A pre-reading quick write will help set the tone for students to engage in Hearts and Hands.

Stop N Jot

This is a fabulous activity that helps keep students focused on the reading. Students stop reading, think about what they’ve read and then jot down the main ideas, questions, thoughts and feeling they had as they read.

Vocabulary Words

Eight words from the story have been selected for further study.

Character Descriptions

Students should think about each of these three characters, what we know about them and how they would describe them to their people, then write a short paragraph about each of them.

Questions

There are 4 higher level questions that require students to demonstrate their understanding of the story, demonstrate an ability to predict what happens next, and analyze specific aspects of the story and title.

An answer key is included for portions of the reading guide as appropriate. Activities that encourage creative and critical thinking will not have an answer key as more than one answer is appropriate.

All Middle School Café Short Story units are designed to help educators get the most out of each story and encourage students to engage in critical thinking. Reading guides are appropriate for both middle school and high school.

*** The Romance of a Busy Broker is part of the public domain. A PDF version of the story is included in this product.