Literacy Design Collaborative
Macbeth: Influence of Supernatural
Something wickedly wonderful this way comes in a instructional activity that focuses on Macbeth. After a close reading of the play, class members craft a literary analysis essay in which they use evidence from the text to show how...
EngageNY
Grade 9 ELA Module 3, Unit 3, Lesson 1
The opening exercise in this instructional unit introduces class members to the writing process they will follow to craft an informative, expository research paper that addresses their research question. To begin, writers are asked to...
University of North Carolina
Reading to Write
Silly journal and essay prompts may be fun to write, but they don't model the kind of writing needed for college papers and standardized tests. The 15th part in a series of 24 covers the concept of reading to write—during and after...
University of North Carolina
Literature Reviews
A literature review goes beyond simply giving a novel a thumbs up or thumbs down. In fact, it may not require an opinion at all. Using a handout on literature reviews, part of a larger series on specific writing assignments, writers...
Weber County Library
Abstract Ideas Explored: Writing with Extended Metaphor
A 25-page packet includes eight detailed lesson plans centered around poems by Emily Dickinson. Each lesson begins with a burning question that high schoolers attempt to answer by using evidence from Dickinson's poems.
Literacy Design Collaborative
Building Ideas and Making Connections: "Monkey See, Monkey Do"
Reading a scientific article about cross-species synchronization may sound like a yawner. But "Monkey See, Monkey Do" is a fascinating tale that just happens to be about yawning, within and across species. After a close reading, class...
University of North Carolina
Verb Tenses
Twelve categories of verbs exist in the future tense, ranging from simple present to future perfect progressive, but only three have a place in academic writing. Those three tenses make up the content of an informational handout that...
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Nineteen Eighty-Four George Orwell
The depth of Nineteen Eighty Four is in the details. Encourage a close reading of Orwell's dystopian classic with resource sheets that focus attention on the author's stylistic choices that lead to the betrayals that make Big Brother's...
Star Wars in the Classroom
"Shakespeare and Star Wars": Lesson Plan Day 4
Class members have an opportunity to compare how a film and a play handle the same source material by viewing the opening chapters of George Lucas's Star Wars: A New Hope and acts I and II of Ian Doescher's play, William Shakespeare's...
Curated OER
Poetry Assignment
As the culminating activity in a unit study of poetry, class members demonstrate what they have learned about poetry by creating a notebook containing original poems they have written, published poems they enjoy, and analyses of these...
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
The Old Man and the Sea Ernest Hemingway
Accompany a reading of Ernest Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea with a thorough literature packet. Although the materials are meant to prepare readers for a timed essay, the background information and the activities are sure to engage...
Curated OER
WWI Propaganda Choice Activity
World War I propaganda techniques employed by the United States government are the focus of this lesson plan. The resource includes an excellent handout of propaganda techniques, ranging from appealing to authority to repetition, lying,...