Curated OER
Interpreting Characters, Setting, Plot, and Theme - The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Disaster
Examine story development and historical disaster with your class. Learners view a video depicting the incidents surrounding The Triangle Shirtwaist Disaster. They use graphic organizers and the Internet to gather enough information to...
Literacy Design Collaborative
Tracing Character Development in Miss Awful
Scholars take a close look at Roger in Miss Awful. As the plot develops, readers track Roger's perceptions of his substitute teacher. Learners then discuss how Roger's actions toward the substitute changes as the story progresses before...
Curated OER
Applying Character and Setting to Play Readings
Read Ira Sleeps Over, then identify elements of plays that are also common to books. Learners analyze character and setting, consider how these elements relate to a play, then write a one-paragraph skit using the characters from Ira...
Curated OER
Express Yourself Lesson Seed 13: Character Development 2
Building upon prior lessons in the series, this reading and writing exercise requires pupils to look back at their own writing, track character development in the novel The Cay, and analyze how Phillip has changed. The reading focus is...
Curated OER
Do You Have Character?
Sixth graders read Katherine Paterson's novel, Bridge to Terabithia, and watch a video of Maurice Sendak's book, Where the Wild Things Are. They examine the characters in both stories that share similar characteristics. Students use the...
Curated OER
Express Yourself Lesson Seed 10: Character Development
Make a study of Timothy and his development as a character over the course of the first half or so of The Cay. This idea focuses in particular on chapters 10 through 12. Learners start out by working on double-entry journals created in...
Curated OER
Character Development-Nanavi, A Girl from Benin, West Africa
Young scholars 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. Young scholars analyze the changes the girl...
Curated OER
The Outsiders Project Guide
Hand out these project ideas when working with The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton. Pupils can choose from six different options or propose their own. The idea is that they will complete more than one project to meet the point requirement. The...
Curated OER
Twisted Tales
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...
Curated OER
Characterization
A 46-slide presentation focuses on ways to describe characters in stories, how to create story characters, and how to show a character's personality in a student-created story. The colorful and engaging slides provide lots of great ideas...
Curated OER
Call of The Wild
Prompt your class to interact with Jack London's Call of the Wild. By analyzing the events in the novel, middle schoolers discover how human experiences create who a person becomes. They critique and analyze the reading, focusing on...
Curated OER
Mystery Lessons
Learn about mysteries with your readers. They will investigate plot, basic elements of mystery, famous characters, and become familiar with genre vocabulary. Bring in props and mystery books to begin and then have learners create story...
Curated OER
Literature Study Guide: Siddhartha
Though this book report form is labeled Siddhartha, the multiple-page format would work for any novel you are reading in class. Complete with a reading schedule, a summary page, a list of generic literature response questions, and a list...
Curated OER
The Effects of Character Decisions
Learners explore characters' decisions. They play a card game in which they match a decision card with a direct effect card. Then they examine characters from The Wizard of Oz, record important decisions that they make on index cards,...
Scholastic
A Reading Guide to A Wrinkle in Time
Accompany a reading of Madeleine L'Engle's classic tale, A Wrinkle in Time, with a detailed guide equipped with 15 informative and useful chapters. Scholars discover who the author is, why she wrote the book, and crucial story elements...
Curated OER
Crafty Literature Projects to Lure Language Arts Learners
Recognize National Arts and Crafts Month with language arts project ideas to inspire creative learning.
Curated OER
Novel Jeopardy
Play a classroom version of the classic game show Jeopardy, to review and discuss the novel your class has been reading. Questions about plot and other story elements are written on cards and given point values. Divide the class into...
Syracuse City School District
Literary Elements
Address the literary elements in a piece of writing using these materials. The packet includes plenty of resources, and focuses mainly on theme, character, and point of view, with some materials for setting, symbolism, and author's...
Curated OER
Pudd'nhead Wilson: Concept Analysis
Learn all about the book Pudd'nhead Wilson with this analysis of the text. You can plan your unit with the useful teacher information provided here and use the project ideas to enrich instruction.
Curated OER
Introduction to Drama
Introduce your class to drama! You cast each pupil as a different character from a story you have read. They are given a general outline of the scene, act out the scene multiple times, then discuss the weak and strong aspects of each...
Curated OER
Storytelling: Writers' Workshop Learning Center
Evaluating a variety of narrative texts can help build strong writers. Pupils identify plot elements and their relation to personal experience, then apply what they gleaned from the class discussion to create their own narratives.
Curated OER
Dear Diary
Work on narrative writing with this lesson, in which middle schoolers analyze the characters from a selected piece of literature and write narrative diary pieces as the character. They work to understand the point of view of the...
Classroom Adventures Program
Creating Characters
Examine character in depth. Over the course of these six lessons, learners explore their own character traits, determine the traits of characters in the books they read, practice comparing and contrasting, and collaborate in small groups...
Saddleback Educational Publishing
The Jungle Book: Study Guide
Delve into The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling with a helpful study guide. Crossword puzzles, comprehension questions, character descriptions, chapter summaries, and vocabulary exercises connect readers with the classic text of a boy and...