National Humanities Center
Teaching The Great Gatsby: A Common Core Close Reading Seminar
The 41 slides in a professional development seminar model how to use close reading techniques to examine the many layers of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. In addition to passages from the novel, slides provide biographical...
PBS
Pbs Learning Media: Setting in to Kill a Mockingbird
For this interactive lesson, students explore the importance of setting in literature and apply their learning to the novel To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. Students are introduced to the three main components of setting: time,...
Read Works
Read Works: Setting Kindergarten Unit: When (Seasons, Day, or Night)
[Free Registration/Login Required] A lesson plan, based on Look! Snow! by Kathryn O. Galbraith, in which students learn how to utilize text and picture clues to determine basic time elements of setting in a story. Students follow this...
SMART Technologies
Smart: Identifying the Setting of a Story
In this lesson, students learn to identify the setting of a story by both where and when. A Setting quiz follows.
Success Link
Success Link: Characters, Setting, Plot, Conclusion, and Summarizing a Story
This lesson plan offers a step-by-step procedure for teaching students how to identify story elements and to summarize a story. It explains how to use a "Who Am I" activity, as well as a linkage activity in identifying characters and...
Annenberg Foundation
Annenberg Learner: Literature: Describing Setting
Short explanation of setting as a literary term. Written in the context of "What makes a good short story?" A link at the bottom of the page leads to additional information about setting.
Google
Google for Education: Writing a Story
In this activity, student storytellers write a story with each group member writing one chapter based on a set of story points. After all the members have come up with their chapters independently, the group collaborates to make the...
TES Global
Tes: West Side Story (1961) Film Guide
[Free Registration/Login Required] This is a film guide for the film West Side Story (1961), the musical adaptation of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, which is set in 1950s New York and incorporates themes around street crime,...
Annenberg Foundation
Annenberg Learner: Elements of a Story Interactive
Explore different ingredients, or elements, that go into stories and make them so much fun. Read the story, "Cinderella," and look at all the different pieces of the tale to see how they all fit together.
Read Works
Read Works: Setting Kindergarten Unit: Where
[Free Registration/Login Required] Use the book Gaspard at the Seashore by Anne Gutman to teach clues students can use to determine where a story takes place. The book must be provided by the teacher, but downloadable worksheets for...
E Reading Worksheets
E Reading Worksheets: Setting Worksheets
In this learning module, students will study the concept of setting in literary text. Worksheets and PowerPoint lessons are provided to help students practice with finding "settings" and then citing reasons that support their answers.
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Holt, Rinehart and Winston: Elements of Literature: Analyzing Setting [Pdf]
Use this graphic organizer for analyzing setting and its effect on the meaning of any story.
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: Writing a Simple Book Report With Your Listening Center
You probably have a listening center in your room. This lesson shows your students how to describe the characters and setting in a story after they've listened to the story on tape.
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: Miss Nelson Is Missing Key Details
Where did Miss Nelson go? We look at the key details in the text to determine what is happening throughout the story. Students will locate and record key details about story elements (characters, setting, problem, solution, and theme) in...
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...
The Balanced Literacy Diet
The Balanced Literacy Diet: Interactive Story Retelling
The goal of Interactive Story Retelling: Encouraging Retelling with Picture Supports is to build early comprehension skills and promote oral expression by having students sequence the events in a story using pictures and then retell the...
Other
Fiction Writing Tips: Creating a Vivid Setting
Some excellent guidelines to consider when evaluating your setting in a short story or novel. Discusses the importance of setting, some examples, as well as practical advice in setting your story. W.11-12.3d Sensory/precise lang narratives
Alabama Learning Exchange
Alex: Reading and Writing About Miss Moo
Lesson for early elementary and special education students utlizing the book Miss Moo Goes to the Zoo by Kelly Graves and graphic organizers to identify elements in a story (title, author, setting, characters, etc.). Students participate...
Curated OER
Mc Graw Hill: Setting
Resource helps with understanding the setting of a story through the use of details.
Read Works
Read Works: Grade 2: Two Lesson Unit: Setting
[Free Registration/Login Required] A set of two lesson plans designed to teach students to use context clues to identify the setting and changes within it. Lessons are based on the books Bigmama's by Donald Crews and The Stories Julian...
Read Works
Read Works: Setting 1st Grade Unit
[Free Registration/Login Required] A series of three lesson plans designed to teach students to use pictures and word clues to determine the setting of fiction texts. Lessons are based on the books The Cow Who Wouldn't Come Down by Paul...
Read Works
Read Works: Setting Kindergarten Unit: Where and When
[Free Registration/Login Required] Based on Knuffle Bunny by Mo Willems, a lesson in which students learn how to utilize text and picture clues to determine a when and where the story takes place.
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: Day 1 Rude Giants
Students will use illustrations and details in a story to describe its characters, setting, and events by working with partners to ask and answer questions about the text.
Alabama Learning Exchange
Alex: Using a Fairy Tale to Teach the Elements of a Story
Students will hear and read different versions of a familiar fairy tale and identify what elements a story must have (character, plot, setting) for the story to be interesting and make sense. Using a Venn diagram, students will then...