Use art museum paintings as inspiration for your class's creative writing works. Observing the paintings closely, middle and high schoolers list details and write descriptions. Their completed stories are displayed on bulletin boards...

Explore figurative language with your secondary class. Extending a language arts unit, the lesson prompts middle schoolers to examine how an author's word choice establishes a story's tone, possibly using metaphors, similes,...

Augment your eighth grade language arts curriculum with a thorough set of reading comprehension activities and assessments. Focusing on a variety of skills, including vocabulary in context, text structure, main idea, and author's style,...

S.E. Hinton's The Outsiders is still relatable to teenagers today, even though it was written more than 50 years ago. Explore how the figurative language of the story works to establish characterization, and how foreshadowing lays...

Language arts learners don't need a lecture about poetry; they listen to poetry every day on the radio! Apply skills from literary analysis to famous songs and beautiful lyrics with a lesson about literary devices. As...

Analyze the components of precise wording and vivid language in this language arts lesson plan. Middle school writers illustrate a passage from Mark Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and write a response to a Norman Rockwell print....

Whether you are viewing a landscape painting of a farm, examining a still-life portrait of a bowl of fruit, or reading a descriptive poem about cultivating food, you can't deny that agriculture plays a major role in visual and language...

Similes and metaphors make writing more beautiful and detailed, but can be a little harder to decipher during a first reading. Use a passage from The Man Who Loved Words to show young readers how to think through passages that...

Give your resource class an overview of grammar. While these slides are not complicated, they are nonetheless geared toward middle and high-school learners, who understand some academic language. The presentation ends with a list of...

Eighth graders are introduced to performance art as a way to respond to important current-day issues in society. Pupils create their very own original art work using photography and poetry. These three lessons do a nice job of, not only...

Explore objective and subjective writing in this interdisciplinary lesson, which brings language arts and visual art together. Middle and high school students examine the sculpture Head with Horns by Paul Gauguin. They then analyze the...

Show what you know. Learners demonstrate mastery of English grammar and usage by completing a pen-and-paper assessment of verbals and verb shifts. In addition, they begin composing a book review based on an independent reading book. The...

Ready to integrate technology into your ELL instruction? Check out this reading lesson that has language learners using the Internet and apps, joining online book clubs, and creating blogs. A fine model of what can be done.

Middle schoolers look closely at Martin Luther King Jr's "I Have a Dream" speech and use a language analysis sheet to determine if King's sentences use active or passive voice. They then move their attention back to A Mighty Long Way to...

High school artists observe and research the illustrations and techniques of N.C. Wyeth. They read (and reread) stories and illustrate the texts using methods inspired by Wyeth's practice. Includes detailed instructional plan and useful...

Improve writing skills using methods from Robert Gay's Writing Through Reading; Gay espouses reproducing the work of successful writers to build the ability to convey original ideas effectively. Young writers transcribe, paraphrase,...

Engage in an activity that focuses on the concepts of formal and informal language use. Middle and high schoolers compare and contrast each style by using a Venn diagram that includes some examples. They read and hear a passage of lyrics...

The Pledge of Allegiance, the Gettysburg Address, the National Anthem, and the Preamble to the Constitution all get close attention in an exercise that asks learners to rewrite these formally-worded documents into informal language....

Research, art history, and web page creation! Sounds too good to be true. With tons of links and resources, the lesson provides you with everything needed to engage the class in an amazing art and research activity. They create...

Scholars demonstrate their learning with an end-of-unit assessment. They work independently to discuss the Golden Rule and its relationship in To Kill a Mockingbird.

Middle schoolers practice evaluating art by creating a research project and presentation. They use the Internet and library to discover a piece of art or artist whom they feel has an impact on the world of art. Next, they create a...

When is a staple remover a fanged monster? In your ELA classroom when you're teaching this fun figurative language lesson, of course! Get your young writers using figurative language by making a game of it. Give groups a paper bag full...

As the saying goes, art often imitates life ... and literature! A series of activities designed to accompany a visit to the Ogden Museum of Southern Art encourage writers to find inspiration in various landscapes. The lesson includes a...

Explore the elements of science fiction. Students investigate the literary elements present in science fiction and write their own science fiction stories.