Curated OER
Lesson Plan 11: Beginnings
Every good novel needs a solid beginning! Setting the stage can have your budding authors stumped, so use this instructional activity to get them thinking. After examining the plot rollercoaster image (included) they consider the four...
Curated OER
Lesson Plan 17: Novel, Take 2
It's all about using peer resources in this writing process lesson, which includes a fantastic novel revision worksheet packet. Learners have read a partner's story draft the night before, and groups have a "lightning round of praise"...
Curated OER
Persuasion as Text: Organizational, Grammatical, and Lexical Moves in Barbara Jordan’s "All Together Now"
A thorough lesson on persuasive writing takes middle schoolers through several activities, including group discussion, collaborative posters, and independent writing. They compare historical speeches and analyze the persuasive techniques...
For the Teachers
Story Strips Sequencing
What happens next? Work on story sequence with a lesson plan that prompts kids to put a story back in order. Additionally, they discuss what would happen if one event was missing from the sequence.
Penguin Books
Folklore and Fairytales: A Guide to Using Traditional Tales and Reimagined Classics
Every culture has its own stories to tell. An interesting educator's guide shares a large collection of fairytales and folktales, some from different cultures and some re-creations of classics. A summary and brief teaching ideas...
Curated OER
Letters to Poets
Add a strong poetry lesson to your literature unit. Middle and high schoolers investigate their writing voices with journaling and group discussion, then choose a famous poet to study. They write letters to their chosen poets, explaining...
EngageNY
End of Unit 3 Assessment: Writing a Research Synthesis
Ready, set, write! Scholars work on the end-of-unit assessment by completing a writing prompt. They then look at the model performance task from instructional activity two to create a rubric for scoring the exercise. Using turn and talk,...
EngageNY
Performance Task: Planning the Final Brochure
Partners use a Brochure Planning Guide to create brochures giving advice to consumers about products based on the research they finished about working conditions. After planning the brochure, they complete a sketch outline and then begin...
EngageNY
Module Reflection and Writing Book Reviews
Scholars take time to reflect on the unit and the end-of-unit writing assessment. They use a Working Conditions Reflection to help guide them through the exercise. Readers then begin working on a book review for the book they have been...
Curated OER
Our Town: Using Song Lyrics in the Classroom
Bruce Springsteen’s “My Hometown” and Billy Joel’s “Allentown” motivate young lyricists to craft poems about their own home town. Groups compare the two songs, identifying details, symbols, and conflicts. Individuals then picture a place...
Curated OER
Parts of the Plot: Constructing A Plot Diagram
After reading "The King of Mazy May" by Jack London, learners reinforce their literary analysis skills in this SMART board lesson. The provided SMART board file allows themto define elements of a short story, and then add it to the plot...
Curated OER
Foreshadowing and Making Predictions
"What happens next?" Using real-life scenarios, movies, images, and other prompts, pupils practice making predictions based on inferences from clues. A SMART board activity takes them from making predictions to writing a prediction...
Curated OER
Promises, Promises
If someone breaks a promise, is that person no longer trustworthy? Present your 6th and 7th graders with a series of statements and have them debate their opinions with supporting evidence. As an extension, have your students write a...
EngageNY
End of Unit Assessment: Tracing and Evaluating Arguments
Give water the attention it deserves. Scholars watch Corporations Need to Pay More Attention to Water and respond to questions as part of their end of the unit assessment. They then complete the assessment by reading and responding to...
Curated OER
Using Drama to Examine Communities: Walking in Others' Shoes
Encourage your readers to make connections between texts with this resource. After compiling notes for each text read (you choose the texts), groups craft skits in which major characters from each text meet. There is a rubric for the...
Curated OER
Persuasive Techniques in Advertising and Make Your Own Advertisement
Are you looking for a collaborative and fun way to teach persuasion? This could be a great resource for you! After reviewing advertising techniques and searching for examples of propaganda, have your class create and present their own...
Curated OER
Persuasive Writing-"Those Whales"
Use an article about an Orca killing a trainer to help writers complete a persuasive essay. The article, other templates, and models are attached. Scholars divide up into groups of three where each person takes a different role,...
Teach with Movies
Teaching Students to Write a Narrative
Encourage narrative writing with a clever exercise. Class members watch episodes from movies and describe what happened to a character, including details about the setting, plot, and characters. Writers then craft a narrative about a...
For the Teachers
Fact vs. Opinion
Many informational texts are written as factual, but can your learners determine when an opinion is presented as fact? Have your kids read several articles on the same topic and record the statements that contain either facts or...
For the Teachers
Main Idea Outline
Find the main idea in an informational text with a versatile lesson. Three levels of differentiation help you implement the strategy in any age or class level, based on the ability and objectives of your learners.
Curated OER
Phineas Gage: Questioning Strategy
Focus on chapter two of Phineas Gage: A Gruesome but True Story About Brain Science with a questioning activity. After teaching and modeling several types of questions, learners work with partners and then independently to answer and...
Torrey Maldonado
Anti-Bullying & Conflict-Resolution Lesson
Invite your class to consider how to respond to a conflict. Designed to be used alongside Secret Saturdays by Torrey Maldonado, a lesson plan focuses on a set of terms: conflict, escalate, deescalate, conflict resolution, denial, and...
Curated OER
Greed is Good?
From Mr. Merdle to Mr. Madoff? A viewing of the PBS adaptation of Charles Dickens’ “Little Dorrit” launches an examination of greedy characters in literature and a study of greed, unfairness, and economic hardship today. The richly...
Curated OER
The Hobbit
Here’s a series of exercises designed to be used after readers have finished reading The Hobbit. Pairs identify the speaker of a series of quotes, match characters with qualities, and provide evidence from the story to support their...