Nat a Chance

by Maria Scrivan

Verification note: Maria Scrivan’s Nat books are middle-grade graphic novels, rather than conventional picture books; a publisher synopsis or the text of Nat a Chance is needed to confirm this installment’s plot. The series follows Natalie, or Nat, as she navigates friendship, belonging, and growing confidence through expressive cartoon storytelling. This provisional teaching package uses that established series context without inventing title-specific events; select and verify the suggested excerpts before teaching.

Big Idea

Graphic storytellers control how readers experience a moment through words, pictures, panel arrangement, and pauses. Studying Nat’s perspective can also help students consider how feelings and interpretations influence responses to everyday challenges.

Discussion Questions

1.Choose a moment when Nat has a strong reaction. What do her words tell us, and what do the pictures add?
2.Where do Nat and another character seem to understand the same situation differently? What evidence supports each perspective?
3.Which moment did you read quickly, and which made you slow down? What choices by the author and illustrator affected your reading?
4.What does Nat appear to want in a scene you studied? How do her actions help or complicate that goal?
5.After reading, how do you interpret the title Nat a Chance? Which details support your interpretation?

Lesson Plan

⏱ 45 minutes📦 A classroom copy of Nat a Chance, teacher-selected excerpt, paper, three-panel and six-panel templates, pencils, crayons or markers, sticky notes

Learning Goals

Use evidence from words and illustrations to explain Nat’s feelings or perspective.
Sequence a scene into a clear beginning, middle, and end.
Compare how panel count, dialogue, and visual details affect pacing.
Revise a comic to emphasize an important emotional moment.

Activity Steps

1.Before the lesson, select a short scene from Nat a Chance with a clear action and reaction. For K–2, use a brief, accessible excerpt; for grades 3–5, include more dialogue and visual inference.
2.Read the scene together. Identify what happens, what Nat appears to feel, and which details provide evidence.
3.Model a three-panel retelling that preserves the scene’s essential action without adding unsupported dialogue or events.
4.Have students draw their own three-panel retelling, then expand it into six panels by showing smaller actions, facial expressions, or silent reactions.
5.Partners read both versions and explain where their reading speeds changed. Students revise one panel to make the intended pace clearer.
6.Share selected examples and complete the reflection: “I slowed this moment down by ___ because ___.” Younger students may dictate their responses.

Standards Connections

ELA: RL.K.3 / RL.1.3 — Identify or describe characters, settings, and major events using details.
ELA: RL.2.7 / RL.3.7 — Explain how illustrations contribute to understanding characters, setting, mood, or story.
ELA: W.3.3b / W.4.3b / W.5.3b — Use dialogue and descriptions to develop events and show characters’ responses; grade 5 explicitly includes pacing.
ELA: SL.K.1–SL.5.1 — Participate in collaborative discussions using grade-appropriate listening and speaking skills.
SEL: Self-awareness and social awareness — Identify emotions and consider different perspectives.

Pace-Write-Read Study with Pace-Write It!

Pace-Write-Read asks students to notice how a story moves, try a related writing choice, and reread to hear or see its effect. Maria Scrivan’s Nat series offers a useful context for this work because graphic storytelling distributes meaning across language, facial expressions, gestures, and sequential images. For Nat a Chance, begin with a verified excerpt rather than an assumed plot summary, and ask students to investigate how that particular passage guides their attention. A quick action can occupy several panels, while a longer stretch of time can pass between two images. Students can therefore separate story time—how long an event takes—from reading time—how long the storyteller invites us to spend with it. A close look at Nat’s expression, a silent panel, or a brief exchange can become an opportunity to discuss both craft and perspective, wherever those features occur in the selected pages. For K–2, emphasize oral storytelling, drawing, sequencing, and noticing feelings; teacher-read excerpts may be more appropriate than independent reading. For grades 3–5, add analysis of dialogue, visual inference, and revision. The central workshop question is: How can we help a reader linger on the moment that matters?

Element	How to notice or teach it in the novel
1. Pacing	Compare two passages from Nat a Chance that students experience at different speeds. Ask them to explain how panel size, text load, and changes in action influence that experience.
2. Plot	Map the verified events of a selected Nat scene as goal, action, and result. Distinguish events that move the situation forward from panels that help readers understand a reaction.
3. Prosody	Read Nat’s speech aloud using phrasing and emphasis supported by punctuation and expression. Try a second delivery and discuss how the interpretation changes.
4. Word	Choose one word from Nat’s dialogue or narration that carries strong feeling. Test a replacement and discuss whether it changes her voice or the scene’s pace.
5. Concept	After reading, propose a central concept such as belonging, confidence, or misunderstanding only if the text supports it. Gather panels that develop that concept across the book.
6. Voice & Worldview	Look for language or visual framing that reveals how Nat interprets a situation. Ask what seems important to her and how the storytelling helps readers recognize that priority.
7. Point of View	Identify whose thoughts readers can access in the selected pages and how that access is shown. Retell one exchange from another character’s perspective while labeling any invented thoughts as inference.
8. Setting & Place	Identify the actual setting of the chosen scene using visual and verbal evidence. Discuss which background details orient readers quickly and which invite closer inspection.
9. Original Characters	List specific traits that distinguish Nat from another character in this installment. Require evidence from actions, expressions, or speech rather than relying on a general label such as “nice.”
10. Dialogue	Study a verified conversation involving Nat and notice how speech balloons divide the exchange into beats. Read it with and without pauses to explore its timing.
11. Details	Find a small gesture or facial detail that changes how students understand Nat’s response. Ask what readers would lose if that detail disappeared.
12. Descriptions	Compare information supplied by pictures with information supplied by words. Have students describe one panel in prose, then identify what the image communicates more immediately.
13. Firsts	Locate the first appearance of an important person, place, or problem in this installment. Discuss what readers learn immediately and what remains unknown.
14. Immediacy & Engagement	Examine the opening pages and identify the first detail that attracts students’ attention. Explain whether action, a question, an expression, or another feature creates that engagement.
15. Story Scenes, Summaries & Structures	Contrast a moment shown through sequential action with any passage that compresses events. If no summary appears in the excerpt, have students summarize the scene themselves and compare the effect.
16. Tension / Suspense / Surprise	Find a point where readers are uncertain what Nat will do or what will happen next. Identify the information Scrivan provides and the information temporarily withheld.
17. Flashback, Flash-Forward, Cliffhanger	Check the book for these devices rather than assuming they occur. If one is absent, create a clearly labeled alternative version of a Nat scene and discuss how the added device changes its pace.
18. Page Turns and Chapter Breaks	Inspect what appears immediately before and after a page turn in your edition. Discuss whether it delays an answer, reveals a reaction, shifts time, or simply continues the action; examine chapter breaks only if present.
19. Pace & Creativity	Redraw a verified Nat moment using a different number of panels while keeping its events unchanged. Compare which version best emphasizes the moment’s meaning.
20. Play	Invite students to experiment with exaggerated timing in a practice retelling of Nat’s reaction. Separate playful student inventions from what actually appears in the book.
21. Performance	Perform a short exchange from the text, including gestures supported by the illustrations. Use a silent reader to signal panel changes so performers experience the scene’s visual beats.
22. Personality	Track how Nat’s personality emerges through choices across two scenes. Ask whether her behavior changes with the situation and what evidence explains that difference.
23. Humor	Choose a passage students find funny, if one occurs in the selected reading. Locate its setup and payoff, then examine how an expression, contrast, or delayed reaction contributes.
24. Pause	Look for a silent panel or a moment with little visible action. Discuss whether it invites readers to consider Nat’s feelings, anticipate a response, or notice something else.
25. Poetry / Poetic Devices	Search the actual language for sound play, repetition, figurative language, or rhythmic phrasing without assuming these features are present. If none appears, students can write an original poetic caption for a panel and compare its effect.
26. Repetition	Look for repeated words, expressions, images, or situations across Nat a Chance. Discuss whether the repetition builds emphasis, familiarity, humor, or a sense of change.
27. Rhythm	Tap once for each panel while rereading a selected sequence. Notice how alternating speech, action, and reaction creates a pattern distinct from the rhythm of the words.
28. Punctuation	Inspect the punctuation in a short passage of Nat’s speech. Read it accurately, then alter the punctuation in a practice copy to test changes in timing and tone.
29. Questions	Identify a question a character asks or a question the scene raises for readers. Track when it is answered and how that delay affects interest.
30. Compare-Contrast	Compare Nat’s words with her expression in one panel, noting agreement or possible tension. Support interpretations carefully rather than assuming every mismatch signals dishonesty.
31. Objects	Choose an object actually visible in the selected scene. Determine whether it helps establish place, directs attention, supports an action, or has a larger role supported elsewhere in the book.
32. Threes	Check for three related actions, images, or verbal beats. If no meaningful pattern occurs, use a student-created three-panel retelling to test setup, development, and payoff.
33. Lists	Look for an actual list or accumulation of related details in the book. If absent, make a planning list of the selected scene’s essential actions and decide which deserve their own panels.
34. White Space & Negative Space	Study the spaces between panels and any uncluttered areas within them. Ask where readers must infer an action or passage of time, and how empty space directs attention.
35. Art & Graphics	Analyze how Scrivan’s drawings communicate Nat’s posture, emotion, and relationship to others. Identify information readers obtain from the art that the words do not repeat.
36. Interactives & Gamification	Use a classroom “pacing detective” challenge: students locate evidence for a quick moment, a pause, and a transition. This is a teaching extension, not a claim that the book contains interactive features.
37. Placement	Examine where a revealing expression or important line appears within a page. Discuss how moving it earlier or later might change what readers expect.
38. Form	Rewrite a short Nat sequence as a prose paragraph. Compare how comics and prose handle dialogue, simultaneous visual information, and the reader’s experience of time.
39. Dummy	Fold paper into a small planning booklet and place one beat of a verified scene on each page. Test page turns with a partner before adding finished drawings.
40. Passion	Identify something Nat demonstrably cares about in this installment and cite her choices as evidence. Invite students to give an original character an equally clear concern that motivates a short comic.

Pace-Write It!

20-minute task: Stretch Nat’s Reaction. Before class, select a verified short sequence from Nat a Chance in which Nat responds to an event or another character; choose an excerpt that clearly supports discussion of her reaction. Minutes 0–4: Read the sequence and identify its action, reaction, and visual evidence. Minutes 4–7: Students sketch a three-panel retelling that preserves what actually happens. Minutes 7–13: Expand the reaction into a five-panel version by adding smaller movements, a closer view, or a silent beat—not a new plot event; label any invented detail as an adaptation. Minutes 13–17: Partners read both versions and explain which feels slower and why. Minutes 17–20: Revise one panel and complete the reflection, “I helped the reader notice Nat’s ___ by ___.” K–2 students may draw and dictate; grades 3–5 should explain how their revision changes emphasis without changing the event.

Classroom Activities

One Nat Moment, Two Speeds

Students study a verified, age-appropriate scene featuring Nat, then retell the same event in two comic strips: a quick three-panel version and a slower six-panel version. By adding reaction shots, pauses, or visual details rather than new events, students discover how pacing changes a reader’s experience.

One Nat Moment, Two Speeds

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