Curated OER
Philanthropic Literature: Quilt to Freedom
A reading of Sweet Clara and the Freedom Quilt by Deborah Hopkinson launches this study of slavery, freedom, and the Underground Railroad. After a discussion of the importance of showing respect for others and of helping each other in...
Curated OER
Plot Development and Conflict
Learners explore plot development and how conflicts are resolved. In this plot development and conflict instructional activity, students discuss antonyms and list the ones they find in their story. Learners complete online activities and...
Curated OER
Introducing Setting and Accents
Fourth graders discuss the concept of setting and how it affects the events and tone of a story. They observe the cover of the book they are reading and make predictions about the setting. They read the first chapter and then refine...
Curated OER
Story Plot Terms
This literary terms handout defines introduction, rising action, climax, falling action, and denouement.
Curated OER
Write, Right
This resource provides the beginning ideas for a instructional activity on writing a narrative. Learners watch a video, identify story elements, including plot and setting, and then write their own stories. If augmented, this...
Curated OER
Character Development-Nanavi, A Girl from Benin, West Africa
Students examine the ways a character changes throughout the course of a story. In this literary analysis lesson, students discuss a story that spans three years in a young girl's life. Students analyze the changes the girl experiences...
Nazareth College
Creative Writing
Students discuss creative writing—what makes something creative writing? Each learner starts writing a story and after 15 minutes, they pass their story to another who adds to it. After another 15 minutes of writing, the story is passed...
Curated OER
Character and Plot Development Through Comics
Third graders are introduced to character, plot development, point of view, and tone through the use of comic strips. They, in pairs, identify these four attributes in the comic strip and present their findings to the class.
ReadWriteThink
Read Write Think: Comics in the Classroom: Introduction to Narrative Structure
Contains plans for four lessons that teach students about narrative plot structures by using "The Three Little Pigs" fairy tale or a similar story. In addition to objectives and standards, this instructional plan contains links to sites...
Sophia Learning
Sophia: Creating Graphic Organizers
This tutorial focuses on creating graphic organizers for a variety of purposes. It presents the following types of organizers, their uses, and the format of each: the Cornell method, charting method, cause and effect organizers, flow...
Texas Education Agency
Texas Gateway: Explain Influence of Setting on Plot Development in Literary Text
In this lesson, students will review two elements of fiction, setting and plot, and learn how the setting influences the plot in stories.
Texas Education Agency
Texas Gateway: Explain Influence of Setting on Plot Development in Literary Text
This lesson is about the relationship between setting and plot. The setting enhances the story by folding the plot into a place and time that fits perfectly with what is going on; in fact, it is often the setting that makes the action...
Texas Education Agency
Texas Gateway: Analyze Linear Plot Developments in Literary Texts/fiction
[Accessible by TX Educators. Free Registration/Login Required] This lesson focuses on how conflicts determine the resolution of the story. In this lesson, students learn how to recognize conflict, analyze linear plot, and determine how...
Texas Education Agency
Texas Gateway:writing an Engaging Story With Literary Strategies to Enhance Plot
A learning module that teaches students about writing a short story with a strong plot in seven mini-lessons: Introduction, Choose the Point of View, Figure Out What to Say, Suspend Readers in Midair, Write about a Central Theme, Read A...
Writing Fix
Writing Fix: What Got Stolen?
After reading Grandpa's Teeth by Rod Clement, the writer will plan a scene from a story where a character confronts another character about something that has been stolen. Descriptive details need to take precedence in this scene, as...
Writing Fix
Writing Fix: Showing Plots & Conflicts
In this instructional activity, recommendations from Ralph Fletcher's book called Live Writing will be used as a teacher reference. Students will write introductions to three different stories in their writer's notebooks, but each type...
Writing Fix
Writing Fix: Rolling With the Animals
After reading Duck on a Bike by David Shannon, the writer will plan an original story where an animal (other than a duck) finds itself in a human mode of transportation (other than a bike). Three other animals will react to the unusual...
Sophia Learning
Sophia: Central Conflict
An eight-slide document introducing central conflict in a literary text and providing examples from The Arabian Nights.
Sophia Learning
Sophia: Complication
Notes that introduce complication in plot and show examples of how the conflict becomes more complicated throughout the rising action of a story. Examples are provided from Mary Shelly's Frankenstein and Virginia Woolf's "The Duchess and...
Sophia Learning
Sophia: Denouement
Notes introducing denouement and providing plot diagrams and examples of denouement in three classical texts: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, "Metamorphosis" by Franz Kafka, and "The Duchess and the Jeweler" by...
Texas Education Agency
Texas Gateway: Isolated Scenes and Plot Support
Plots have momentum or a forward motion. In this lesson, we will isolate and discuss specific plot scenes from several works of fiction. You will learn how each scene moves the plot forward toward the resolution.
Louisiana Department of Education
Louisiana Doe: Louisiana Believes: English Language Arts: Grade 4: The Whipping Boy
This unit explores the history of the Middle Ages through the fictional tale of two unlikely friends, Price Brat and his whipping boy. The Middle Ages was defined by a strict class system in government and economy. The novel explores the...
Tom Richey
Slide Share: Elements of Plot
A slide show with ten slides about the parts of a plot development: exposition, conflict, rising action, climax, falling action, and resolution.
Tom Richey
Slide Share: Plot Structure
A slide show with twenty-one slides explaining elements of plot including: characters, setting, exposition, conflict, rising action, climax, falling action and resolution.