Curated OER
Reading Strategies: Main Idea
Identify the main idea and the supporting details of a story in a literacy resource from Discovery Education. Complete with procedures, vocabulary, and assessment activities, this is a great way for pupils to practice their outlining...
Ed Helper Clip Art
Main Idea Mountain
After reading a text, learners fill out a graphic organizer in the shape of a mountain, with the main idea as the peak.
21 x 20 Media
A+ Writing Prompts
Shake it up! Shake your tablet to bring up a unique writing prompt for journaling or blogging with your class. Shake again and a new one appears. Prompts can come from different categories (sketches, scenes, texts, words, news) to help...
Curated OER
Outlining Main Ideas and Details
Begin at the end. Present your class with an expository essay and ask them to create an outline of the article, paying particular attention to the main ideas and the details supporting these ideas. After a discussion of what they have...
Curated OER
Writer's Toolbox
Present the class with a slide show that will give them a great head start in writing expository and narrative texts. The information is highlighted for easy note taking, well organized, and presented in a kid-friendly manner. It...
Curated OER
Nonfiction Genre Mini-Unit: Persuasive Writing
Should primary graders have their own computers? Should animals be kept in captivity? Young writers learn how to develop and support a claim in this short unit on persuasive writing.
EngageNY
Mid-Unit Assessment: Listening for Main Ideas and Supporting Details
Pay attention! Scholars view the video"Why College Students Should Start Paying Attention to Water" multiple times to complete a note catcher. After discussing their thoughts with the class, learners watch "The Water Crisis Isn’t...
Curated OER
Revision Checklist for the Accordion Essay
Encourage your class to revise their writing and check over their work by requiring them to complete an organization checklist. The checklist, created specifically for a accordion-style essay, asks writers to look over their formatting,...
Poetry4kids
Writing Riddles
What's got 60 eyes, 150 fingers, and an endless number of ideas? Your language arts class! Challenge young writers to come up with clever riddles with an online poetry lesson.
DePaul University
A Garden in Lawndale
We are all capable of changing the world for the better; all it takes is a spark. Read about a group of seventh grade learners in Chicago, IL who took it upon themselves to improve their community by turning a vacant lot into a garden....
Curated OER
Find the Main Idea: O Pioneers! by Willa Cather
An excerpt from Willa Cather's O Pioneer's! provides learners with practice in finding the main idea and supporting details in a narrative. As readers record the bleak details on the included graphic organizer, they can conclude that...
Curated OER
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer: Finding the Main Idea
After reading chapter 17 of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, give this graphic organizer to your kids to find the main idea. The circles are small and will probably spark complaints, but the main idea should never be lengthy; it should be...
Curated OER
Express Yourself Lesson Seed 12: Story Event
Focus on plot and the impact-specific events in The Cay. Class members use their double-entry journals, created in a previous lesson in this series, to record their thinking about the guiding question as they read chapters 15 through 17....
Curated OER
Recognizing the Main Idea
Understanding that paragraphs have a main idea expressed in a topic sentence, followed by supporting details in the subsequent sentences is the focus of this presentation. Students practice by reading short paragraphs in 10 slides, and...
Scholastic
Persausive Writing
A unit on persuasive writing guides elementary learners through the writing process. The first part examines the elements of persuasive writing, including expressing an opinion, connecting ideas, using supporting facts, and writing...
Trinity University
Explain Yourself: An Expository Writing Unit for High School
Introduce expository writing with a unit that asks writers to craft an essay to explain a belief, value, or priority that is important to them. Mini-lessons within the unit focus on crafting thesis statements and conclusions, selecting...
Anglais Facile
100 Ideas to Start the Year Back-To-School Icebreakers
It's back-to-school time, and what better way to get learners to know each other than with icebreakers? Bring a list of icebreakers, ranging in grade levels, to the new members of your class.
Fluence Learning
Writing About Literature: Nature in the Writings of John Muir and Emily Dickinson
As an assessment of their skill in crafting a compare and contrast essay, class members read and compare the portrayals of nature in excerpts from naturalist John Muir's My First Summer in the Sierra and from poet Emily Dickinson's "The...
Curated OER
A Walk in the Tundra
Discuss the environment of the Arctic tundra using this resource. The focus of this lesson is the story A Walk in the Tundra by Rebecca L. Johnson. The appealing illustrations are bound to captivate your class! After reading the story,...
Curated OER
Implementing Reader's Workshop in the Primary Classroom
Basic guidelines and lesson ideas for introducing this reading strategy.
Curated OER
Writing a News Article
Join the newspaper business with a series of lessons and exercises focused on elements of journalism. The packet focuses on distinguishing fact from opinion, writing effective headlines, sequencing events, and editing and proofreading a...
DePaul University
Learn about Fables
Expose young readers to a new genre of fiction with a short reading passage. After learning about fables, children identify the main idea and supporting details in preparation for writing a short summary. Read the text as a class,...
Polk Bros Foundation
I Can Identify and Support the Main Idea in Non-Ficiton
Analyze a historical or scientific informational text by determining the main idea and supporting details. This graphic organizer allows pupils to write down the main idea and four details.
Curated OER
With Your Own Two Hands: Are You Changing the World or "Waiting for the World to Change"?
Can your pupils change the world? Explore this question with Ben Harper's song "With My Own Two Hands" and John Mayer's "Waiting for the World to Change." After listening to the songs, they discuss the tools at their disposal for...