Do research projects at your school look like a class of eighth graders staring at a blank screen? Use the Big 6 research method to guide middle schoolers through the process of finding a topic, searching for and evaluating sources,...

Here is an authentic assessment task for Shakespeare's Macbeth. Young literature scholars prepare, perform, and record a news broadcast about the major events in the play. For example, groups may choose to report on the death of Lady...

A scarlet letter “V” stands for a desktop teaching vocabulary activity designed for Speak. Prior to reading Laurie Hales Anderson’s young adult novel, individuals sign up for a word, design a handout that illustrates the word, includes...

What's the best way to learn Spanish? The instruction needs to be authentic and provide more opportunities for real-life Spanish practice. Read this article for some ideas of how you can bring this practice into your classroom or school!

Health nuts create a month-long calendar presenting health-themed pictures, tips, or facts in each day's box. Rather than just a project, you could raise the required number of health facts and use this as a unique assessment of...

Students correctly sequence the steps leading to the formation of wind, and describe the cause and effect relationships involved in the formation of wind. This task assesses students' abilities to classify, generalize, infer, interpret...

Learners sequence the steps leading to the formation of rain, and design a model to represent these steps. This task assesses students' abilities to classify, generalize, infer, interpret and communicate data, and construct a pictorial...

First graders investigate the different water formations by conducting an experiment.  In this water properties lesson, 1st graders examine jars filled with ice, rain water, air and snow in their class.  Students predict what...

Students research the origin of oil and natural gas to gather an understanding of the stages of fossil fuel formation. Then the class creates murals depicting the life cycle of a fossil fuel.

First graders make landform maps of the United States. For this landform lessons, 1st graders participate in a discussion of local landforms and make a landform map of the United States. They follow the teacher's directions to add...

Who would you love to see at your table? Groups research a decade, ranging from the 1840s to the 1960s, read a short story associated with that decade, and plan a dinner party, complete with table set-up and menu. After researching...

Students discover the causes of different types of weather and it's effect on society.  For this environmental lesson, students utilize the Internet to examine cloud types, normal weather conditions and the type of weather...

Here is a fabulous lesson on the Earth's radiant energy system. This amazing, 31-page document is chock-full of great activities, worksheets, lab sheets, quizzes, rubrics, and assessments. Learners model and explain cloud formation,...

Students, assessing a variety of formatting tools with Microsoft Word, utilize a bank of vocabulary words to make a personal dictionary of nouns. They classify nouns for people, places, things and ideas and separate them into common and...

Students create questions to pose to adults working in Middle School. In groups, students create a video interviewing the Middle School staff. They edit the video and format present it as an introduction to Middle School for perspective...

Pairs of learners choose an earth scientist from an extensive list. They collect information by researching online or in books about the childhood, education, and major contributions made by their chosen scientist. When they present...

Middle or high school volcanologists watch the 1997 film, Dante's Peak. They make observations as they watch and then write a movie review, focusing on what was accurately represented. They also point out what facts were stretched by...

Students study a region. In this history lesson, students discover how different people and events have affected the Middle East in its efforts to be a peaceful area. They work in small groups on an assigned topic and present their...

Green roofs aren't just eco-friendly — they are literally green with trees. Groups learn about the concept of green roofs in order to be able to design one. The groups design a 5,000-square-foot green roof for a fictional apartment row...

Mystery is an exciting genre for young readers to investigate. The plots are so intriguing! Here is a series of lessons featuring Sherlock Holmes stories that invite learners to enter the world of the mystery genre.  Based on what...

Help your secondary reader/writers assess texts by studying press releases from Statistics Canada and drafting articles based on them. They then compare the press release, their own articles, and actual news stories they find online. I'd...

Transform a written biography into a video biography! Introduce your learners to the biography format by reading them a few examples (some suggestions are included). Then discuss the factors that make a good biography. What information...

Groups of students create magazines that contain stories and images of one aspect of the ocean, and ocean life. The expectations for the final products are quite high, so this lesson will require some effort to properly implement. A...

Analyze the setting behind the Great Depression in California with Pam Munoz Ryan's Esperanza Rising. Middle schoolers assess the protagonist during her coming-of-age moments, while migrant workers manage the hardships of the...