What would it be like to restore modern works of art? By acting as modern art conservators, learners assess the first-hand difficulties faced in restoration efforts. In addition, they create modern art pieces from random materials. Then,...

Upper graders use the potter's wheel to make Japanese style tea cups, which they will use in a Japanese style tea ceremony. They hone their sculpting techniques while exploring Japanese cultural and the history of tea. There are two...

Readers learn to ask questions about text with an activity based on Ernest Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea. As they read, class members craft questions based on Bloom's Taxonomy and then find the answers themselves.

Kids cast their own plaster tools to stamp image impressions and textures for tiles, pictures frames, and other works of art. Young artists can even create their own watermark to label their stuff.

Introduce your class to ekphrastic poetry with an exercise that asks them to examine Edward Hooper's painting House by the Railroad and Edward Hirsch's poem "Edward Hopper and the House By the Railroad." After a close reading...

Is your head beating as if it would break into twenty pieces looking for activities to accompany a reading of the woeful tale of Juliet and her Romeo? Here's a weighty tool kit that won't hurt your back. The packet is divided into 20...

Here's a colorful activity that can be modified for any age group. Kids create printing blocks and craft t-shirts and/or canvas sacks using the blocks and fabric paint. 

Strengthen your high schoolers' writing with a series of steps for writing successfully. With sections on organizing an essay, choosing a topic, crafting a thesis statement, and revising a draft, the instructional activity encourages...

“The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” is famous, in part, because it established a uniquely American form of humor. For this famous story, Mark Twain combines the tall-tale, the dialect story, and satire. Here is a resource...

"That man is not truly one, but truly two." The Strange Case of  Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde offers readers a change to craft a poem combining words and phrases from Robert Lewis Stevenson's novella to create a poem...

"Now is the summer of our happiness/Made winter by this sudden, fierce attack!" Luke Skywalker meets Hamlet in a 10-lesson unit based on Ian Doescher's William Shakespeare's Star Wars: Verily, a New Hope. Using Star Wars® as source...

Who were Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton? High schoolers examine the character traits of these historical figures and watch the video, The Duel. Hamilton vs. Burr: An Event that Changed History (available from PBS), to gain...

Mickey Mouse, Elmo, and Tintin? Belgian cartoonist Georges (Herge) Remi’s famous comic character launches a study of primary and secondary source material and the impact these sources have on storytelling. Class members also examine the...

Combine art and literature to teach greater themes and symbolic meaning. Using the plan outlined in this resource, expose your class to the story "Zebra" by Chaim Potok, conduct discussions about social issues and nicknames, and ask...

"There comes an end to all things" and ending a study of horror fiction with a multimedia project is "like starting a stone. . . away the stone goes, starting others. . ." In this case, groups start with a question generated by Dr....

Connect science, art, and language arts with a nature-themed bookmaking project. Kids craft book covers, cut paper for pages, and learn how to bind their creations.

"And the award goes to. . . " High schoolers investigate bias in the movie industry by reading articles, watching a short video, and examining data about the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) membership, nominees, and...

Scholars select a novel or play and craft an essay to discuss what the symbol reveals about the characters or theme. Writers also analyze a passage and a poem to determine how the authors use literary elements to relay their messages.

Study cause and effect in both literature and informational text with a lesson designed for several different reading levels. After kids review the concept of cause and effect, they read an article or story and note the causes and...

Art can enhance the understanding of history. That's the big idea in a lesson that has young scholars read Randall Jarrell's poem "The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner" and an excerpt from John Hersey's Hiroshima, which provide a...

Assess your class's understanding of Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility with a fun and creative final project. Using what they have learned about the novel's characters, they create presentations featuring music and images that...

To conclude the study of the play, William Shakespeare's Star Wars: Verily, A New Hope, class members craft an in-class essay comparing Doescher's adaptation to George Lucas's film, Star Wars: A New Hope.

Tired of searching for complex passages suitable for high school level assessments? A challenging examination includes numerous complex text excerpts as well as question items to match them. Learners analyze literary elements, author's...

Artists, musicians, and dramatists have long been the leaders in the quest for social justice. To gain an understanding of the power of the arts to address social issues, class members listen to a reading of Drew Daywalt's The Day the...