Curated OER
Fallacies of Weak Induction
A high-level introduction to fallacies of weak induction, including appeals to unqualified authority and ignorance, hasty generalizations, and weak analogies. Each fallacy is defined and shown with an example. For use mostly in college...
Curated OER
Project Peace Process
Students collaboratively write a peace plan as they role play citizens of foreign countries. In this current events lesson, students take on the role of Israelis or Palestinians, research background information and current political...
Curated OER
Cartoons for the Classroom: Vanishing Newspapers
What is happening to our newspapers? In the context of the current trends of media and the ever-declining print news industry, this handout includes two political cartoons for pupils to analyze, both created by artists working for...
Curated OER
Grammar Workshop: Pronoun Case: I or Me?
Once and for all, discern when to use the pronoun "I" and when to use "me." Clear definitions and examples are given for each category of possessive, subjective, and objective pronouns. In easy-to-understand language, the most helpful...
Curated OER
Investigating Our Past: Where Did Humans Come From?
Investigate the theories of human evolution. In this research based lesson, learners research and discuss how geographic isolation, interbreeding, generalization, and specialization are factors in the history of humans. Groups work...
Curated OER
Like Water for Chocolate: How-to Narrative Essay
Connect Laura Esquivel's Like Water for Chocolate to student experience with this how-to narrative essay. Writers weave the instructions from their own family recipe into a narrative using sensory details. This assignment sheet includes...
Curated OER
Rules of Thumb for Diction
What is the difference between accept and except? Affect and effect? Brilliantly advise your class with the advice in these slides. Definitions of commonly misused words from A-Z help clarify meaning and usage.
Curated OER
Worksheet 7: Print Advertising
Use this versatile, cross-curricular graphic organizer to demonstrate the power of words in advertising. Scholars analyze print advertisements, identifying parts of the ad that stand out. This could include color, celebrity endorsement,...
Curated OER
Aboriginal Education - A Canadian Failure?
Students discover that the education of the Aboriginal was a government and church "mission." They develop respect for the Aboriginal people and their continuing concerns about their treatment at the hands of the missionaries and the...
Curated OER
The Stuff of Stories: Using Museums to Inspire Student Writing
Middle schoolers write descriptions, narratives, and dialogues based on objects of art and time periods in a museum. They base several writing assignments on art objects and paintings, including a literal description and an emotional...
Curated OER
A Year in Review: The Memoir
If you are planning a unit on memoir and autobiographical narrative, you should consider this resource. Using Internet research skills, pupils review works by James Frey and Henry David Thoreau. In response to these works, learners...
Curated OER
With Your Own Two Hands: Are You Changing the World or "Waiting for the World to Change"?
Can your pupils change the world? Explore this question with Ben Harper's song "With My Own Two Hands" and John Mayer's "Waiting for the World to Change." After listening to the songs, they discuss the tools at their disposal for...
Curated OER
Passive Voice Exercises
Strengthen understanding of grammar and syntax with this task. First, grammarians identify the active and passive voices, then they rewrite individual sentences to be in the active voice before manipulating an entire paragraph. Great...
Curated OER
Unlikely Diary keepers Using Diary of a Worm by Doreen Cronin
Put your class in the shoes of someone - or something - else with this lesson, which encourages writers to keep a diary from the perspective of a living creature or an abstraction. Use Doreen Cronin's Diary of a Worm and the Six Trait...
Curated OER
Writing Fables
Young scholars write their own fables. In this writing fables lesson, students use handheld computers to write a fable. The class designs a spreadsheet to organize common elements of fables. Young scholars also edit each others' work.
National Endowment for the Humanities
Faulkner's As I Lay Dying: Concluding the Novel
As I Lay Dying is a beautiful book and a wonderful vehicle for understanding, interpreting, and comparing themes. The class reads and analyzes the novel, discusses possible interpretations, and characterizations. They compare the themes...
Curated OER
The Art of Locomotion
Tenth graders examine the artistic legacy of trains by comparing the representations of trains in the painting of Turner and the photographs of Terry Evans. They write an essay, story or poem using their own observations of trains,...
Curated OER
Taming of the Shrew: Updated, Translated, and Performed
Make The Taming of the Shrew modern and relevant with this outline. Small groups can choose from a list of suggested scenes and update with modern language and settings before acting them out. Great questions refine writing and...
Curated OER
Beowulf
High schoolers complete literature analysis activities for Beowulf. They read lines from the poem and complete character analysis activities. In addition, they write and share a boast modeled on the text and then create heroes and...
Curated OER
Plot and Conflict in W.W. Jacob's "The Monkey's Paw"
Tenth graders analyze the use of literary elements in W.W. Jacob's "The Monkey's Paw." Literary analysis is accomplished by a review of the plot and order of events in the story. Learners work in pairs to match the events from the story...
Curated OER
Children's Media and Censorship
High schoolers form opinions about children and television censorship after analyzing literature. They complete a journal writing activity to identify the topic and make a list of inappropriate television shows for children. Next, they...
Curated OER
Picture Perfect Poetry
Do your language arts students love to draw? Use this lesson to reinforce poetic techniques with illustration. After drawing what they think poem would look like with no words, middle and high schoolers work on several different...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Lesson 2: Religion and the Argument for American Independence
Young scholars examine how religion affected arguments justifying American independence. They read and analyze primary source documents, and write an essay analyzing how Americans used religious arguments to justify revolution against a...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Lesson 1: The First Great Awakening
High schoolers examine the First Great Awakening and how it affected religious belief in colonial America. They read and analyze primary source documents, explore various websites, and write a five-paragraph essay examining the beliefs...