After sharing the story of Jennie's quest to find the perfect hat, have the children draw pictures on index cards illustrating different events from the story. For example, suggest a child draw a picture of Jennie waiting for the gift from her aunt and then on another card, have her depict Jennie's disappointment after opening the gift. Once all of the pictures are complete, shuffle the index cards and lay them out on a table. Ask the children to work together or separately to put the events in order from beginning to end, making sense of the story.
Using a felt or cork board, create a story map to organize what happened in a concise manner. Begin by placing a picture representing "Jennie's Hat" in the middle of the board. Have students place character names and events all over the board. Using a ribbon and pin, make a line connecting "Jennie's Hat" to the first character introduced in the story. From there, take individual ribbons and "map" the adventure each character takes by connecting events around the board. Students can visually see how a sequence of events builds the story.
Prior to reading "Jennie's Hat," ask each child to bring a hat from home to class. Depending on the number of children participating in this lesson, ask each student to draw a particular event from the story. Using clothespins, take each child's drawing and pin it to his or her hat. Play a silly song while the students fly around the classroom like the birds Jennie fed in the book. When the music stops, so must each child; but they're all out of order. By looking at each others' hats, the students must figure out how to properly line up against the wall to depict the story of "Jennie's Hat" properly.
Prepare worksheets to pass out after reading the book. The paper should list the problems, solutions and decisions Jennie faces throughout the story; however, they should be out of order. Read the entire list of events aloud. After reflecting, each student will place a number next to each event to mark the correct order in which each occurred in "Jennie's Hat." When everyone is finished, gather in a circle to discuss how each student figured out the proper order of events.