New ReviewThe unit offers second graders skills practice in tricky spelling and words, grammar—nouns and punctuation, reading decodable texts, and writing a personal narrative. Lessons begin with a warm-up and go into a concept review, word work,...

New ReviewA unit covering second-grade skills reviews 16 letter-sound correspondences, tricky words, and punctuation. Readers provide context for examining story elements, and pupils participate in close reading and write narratives retelling a...

New ReviewZora Neal Hurston, Toni Morrison, and Maya Angelou are featured in a guided inquiry unit. High schoolers research the lives and works of these and other Black women writers and craft an argument, using evidence from their research, to...

A visual literary lesson provides learners with OPTIC (Observations, Predictions, Themes, Inferences, Conclusions), a reading strategy to help them understand and interpret visual and written texts. Scholars practice the strategy with a...

At first glance Sandra Cisneros' The House on Mango Street seems to be a charming collection of vignettes about a young Latina's observations about the people in her Chicago neighborhood. Developing questions that prompt readers to think...

Are you looking for a timely, engaging project-based learning activity for 21st-century learners? Here's a fine one. A carefully scaffolded, richly detailed plan asks scholars, working individually or in small groups, to create original...

Louisa May Alcott's Little Women is a literary masterpiece as well as a timestamp of the formative mid-nineteenth century in America. Using a primary source set of photographs, letters, and portraits, readers discuss the ways...

If you're looking to start a unit based around narrative writing, make sure to consider this resource while you're planning. This book covers five topics: writing personal narratives, writing narratives about others, writing narratives...

An extensive portfolio project encourages your kids to reflect on their personalities with multiple writing assignments. From activities on extended metaphors to writing about an important day in their lives, kids explore the way they...

Grow an understanding of short story with a well-sequenced plan built around an Academy Award-winning short film. Class members explore the elements of an effective short story, and practice writing their own. They also watch the short...

Built around a moving short film about second chances and tough choices, this lesson mixes grammar, prediction, and narrative writing. Pupils practice with adjectives and prefixes before moving on to the film. The resource directs you to...

A short film about music is the inspiration for a well-sequenced instructional activity that includes discussion, group work, and writing. After the whole class converses about music, small groups write narratives about a still from the...

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...

It's the classic scene: Tom Sawyer is whitewashing a fence. Expose your learners to Mark Twain's humor while reinforcing reading comprehension. Eighth graders are encouraged to read and reread, achieving as much exposure to the text as...

Binoculars are used as a metaphor for good descriptive writing. Class members first view a small picture and then an enlarged view of the same image in which the details come into focus. Next, learners examine a paragraph lacking sensory...

Writing can become one-dimensional if authors don't involve all their senses. First, scholars observe a strange object which, ideally, they can touch and even smell. Without using certain words (you can create a list or have the class...

Two narrative excerpts tell the same story from different points of view. In the first excerpt (first person), sequencing words and phrases are bolded and learners write down what the bold type does. The second excerpt is in third...

Help your class find their writing voices with this instructional activity which uses the work of Ralph Fletcher to guide a "Prompt in Reverse" activity. Using the chapter "First Pen" from Fletcher's Marshfield Dreams, learners decipher...

A Six-Trait Writing instructional activity helps your middle schoolers liven up their word choice and shows them how to evaluate their own writing. Class members take a close look at the language used in poems by Shakespeare, Kipling,...

Explore how photographs can represent a whole story to a viewer. Middle schoolers work on narrative writing techniques in this lesson, focusing on photographs from the New York Times to write first-person descriptive narratives....

Experience how a story can drastically change when the point of view is altered. Young scholars first read a review of Disney's film Tarzan, focusing on how the point of view in the classic story is important. They then select another...