Smarter Balanced
American West in the 1800s
To establish a context for an assessment or a study of pioneers and the American frontier in the 1800s, groups examine photos and record observations about clothing, housing, and travel.
Curated OER
Lessons in Looking: Contraband in Paintings
Using the paintings On to Liberty and A Ride for Liberty, 10th graders analyze historical perspectives on life after the Civil War. They attempt to determine what the Civil War meant for free slaves, then read a paragraph highlighting...
Curated OER
Reading Comprehension - Short Stories: "Remains of a Marriage"
Planning a short story unit? Consider including this worksheet early in your plan. "Remains of a Marriage" provides the text that could be used as the basis of a lesson on close reading, on comprehension strategies, and/or group...
Curated OER
Exploring Contrasts in "The Lanyard" by Billy Collins
Middle schoolers analyze the speaker's ideas and tone in the Billy Collins poem "The Lanyard." After identifying how each of the five senses is addressed in the poem, they compare images to draw conclusions about the speaker and his...
Illustrative Mathematics
Extensions, Bisections and Dissections in a Rectangle
Gaining practice in translating a verbal description into a diagram and then an equation is the real point of this similar triangles exercise. Once the diagram is drawn, multiple methods are provided to reach the conclusion. An effective...
For the Teachers
Fact vs. Opinion
Many informational texts are written as factual, but can your learners determine when an opinion is presented as fact? Have your kids read several articles on the same topic and record the statements that contain either facts or...
K12 Reader
Using Inference in Writing
What could have happened to a plane buried in snow? Have kids practice making inferences with a writing prompt for which they describe a photo without using specific key words.
CPALMS
Analyzing Vonnegut's View of the Future and His Commentary on the Present in Harrison Bergeron
Kurt Vonnegut's short story "Harrison Bergeron" engages adolescents with its theme about the dangers of complete societal equality. Learners complete a graphic organizer to track literary elements in the story, as well as an inference...
College Board
Reading—Central Idea and Evidence
Young readers become experts at finding the central idea in informational text with an educational resource. The resource includes helpful tips to annotating close passages to succeed on the actual SAT exam, as well as strategies to make...
Curated OER
Mucket Mania: The Mussel Industry in Arkansas
Middle and high schoolers read and discuss articles about the mussel industry in Arkansas. They pay close attention to the history of pearling and button making industries on the Black and White Rivers of Arkansas. This impressive,...
Central Bucks School District
Making Generalizations
Being able to recognize patterns, craft generalizations, and draw conclusions based on information in a text passage are essential critical thinking skills. Encourage learners to hone these skills with a worksheet that asks them to read...
Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Reading Primary Sources: Darwin and Wallace
Take your classes back in time. Learners read real historical texts from both Darwin and Wallace as well as an announcement of their findings. Using guiding questions, they make inferences and draw conclusions from the information in the...
Curated OER
Size It Up: Map Skills
Compare information from a US population cartogram and a standard US map. Learners draw conclusions about population density by analyzing census data a population distribution. They discover that census data is used to apportion seats in...
EngageNY
Drawing a Conclusion from an Experiment (part 2)
Communicating results is just as important as getting results! Learners create a poster to highlight their findings in the experiment conducted in the previous instructional activity in a 30-part series. The resource provides specific...
Novelinks
Sense and Sensibility: Anticipation Guide Reading Strategy
Begin your discussion about Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility before you even open the book. Kids fill in a worksheet that lists five statements about the literary themes of the novel, and then discuss their opinions as a group. Once...
Curated OER
China's Three Gorges Dam
A very well-done resource includes an informational reading passage describing the controversy and impact of China's Three Gorges Dam. It also includes eight guided reading questions, a pros/cons arguments chart, and a creative writing...
Curated OER
Drawing Conclusions
Tenth graders explore why some teenagers take unnecessary risks. In this decision making lesson, 10th graders read an article on risk taking and draw important conclusions on the topic.
Curated OER
Predict, Draw Conclusions
Students discuss times they predict what will happen next. They compare this to using the information given in a piece of literature to predict what will happen next in the story. Students listen as the teacher reads an excerpt from The...
College Board
Teaching Students How to Write AP Statistics Exam Responses
But this is math—we don't need to know how to write! The article makes a point that class members in AP® Statistics should be comfortable writing as the exams require it. Individuals quickly realize that quality writing is crucial to a...
Penguin Books
An Educator’s Guide to the Works of John Green
The novels of John Green cover the gamut of teenager emotions. A guide to his works provides classroom lesson plans for the novels Looking for Alaska, An Abundance of Katherines, The Fault in Our Stars, and Paper Towns. Each lesson...
Alabama Department of Archives and History
Strange Fruit: Lynching in America
To continue their study of the Civil War, Reconstruction, and the beginning of the civil rights movement, class members watch the YouTube video of Billie Holiday singing "Strange Fruit" as an introduction to an examination of lynching in...
Science 4 Inquiry
Enzymes in Action
Enzymes play a role in almost every function in the human body. Scholars explore three variables related to the use of enzymes. They observe a catalase reaction, experiment with substrates, and examine reactions rates.
Curated OER
Things Aren't Always What They Seem
Students use video and the Internet to make predictions, draw conclusions, determine conflict and point of view while reading a short story. In this short story analysis lesson, students watch a related video and complete a prediction...
National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science
A Case Study of Memory Loss in Mice
Using a short news article, high school or college biologists examine the scientific method in practice. The article, which focuses on an Alzheimer's experiment performed on rats, has very limited information, so learners must be able to...