An extensive portfolio project encourages your kids to reflect on their personalities with multiple writing assignments. From activities on extended metaphors to writing about an important day in their lives, kids explore the way they...

Have your older students assist young children with writing in this community service and literacy lesson. Middle schoolers become partners with a local elementary school. They assist the grade school children in writing a pattern book...

While reading A River Runs Through It, have your high schoolers work on their final project, a multi-genre research paper. There are 10 clear steps for completion but not much additional help. For early high schoolers (or...

Young authors examine a clay figure in order to learn about the 6+1 Trait writing process. They consider how the art was made or buit up step-by-step, they then write about a process in their own lives that occurs in a similar way. 

More space, in this case, means more status. Kids consider the status assigned to Tlingits via house partition. They discuss a carved piece that shows household space partitioned by status. They then write their own clan stories and draw...

Wrap up a documentary creation project with the final lesson in this series. Class members reflect on their learning and compose responses to four questions relating to what they learned, whey they would do differently, and how the group...

Examine the differences between totalitarianism and democracy in this writing instructional activity. Using the same format and theme from Great Expectations, young writers work in pairs to compose their own short stories. They follow...

Bring art and society together with this highly creative and interesting lesson. Learners research various uses of masks in ceremonies. They then create a ceremony of their own and a mask to go along with it. They film themselves...

Have your young television viewers discuss popular shows among their peers. After choosing one show to analyze, middle and high schoolers read about the 2007-2008 network television lineup with the New York Times article "Gauging...

Students determine what grammar is and how they have learned it. In this creative writing lesson plan, students read "Style' Gets New Elements," and respond to the discussion questions. Students then present grammatical rules to one...

Film poems? To concluded a poetry unit, writers select one of their own poems and create a film that brings to life the sounds and images of their work. Included with the detailed unit plan are daily lessons, student examples, a list of...

Who wouldn't love to get a letter from a blue bird? Elementary art enthusiasts analyze the social and historical context of Ason Yellowhair's Navajo piece, Bird and Cornstalk Rug. They examine the construction and images on the rug...

Consider how well young scholars' favorite TV shows, movies and video games reflect the diversity of society. The lesson introduces your class to several media literacy concepts, such as how media conveys values and messages, as well as...

Discuss your class' vision of the future. Learners create materials for use in a time capsule. They write letters to explain their contribution and provide photos.  Afterwards, they use higher-level thinking skills to reflect on why...

Think about a moment, frozen in time. Now take a critical look at the painting, Better, Homes, Better Gardens. This painting works to provide learners the opportunity to analyze art, critique artist's choices, and write a story inspired...

What is a philanthropist? We can all be philanthropists! After assessing the needs of the school and listening to literature about how they can help others, primary learners develop a class project and maintain a journal of their...

Combining art, music, dance, and reading comprehension, this lesson is geared to reach all ability levels. After reading a variety of fables and discussing story elements and character traits, class members select a moral to use as the...

In an effort to practice engineering design, STEM classes break out into teams and endeavor to make a working ink pen. To prepare, they read about writing implements through history, patents, and viscosity of liquids. Armed with this...

Khaled Hosseini’s video “Using Real People and Events” motivates learners to reflect on their own experiences and to use those experiences as the basis of a graphic novel that expresses a universal truth. The richly detailed plan...

Students reflect on field trips in writing. In this journal writing lesson, students write about a recent experience by using 4 of their senses to tell what they remember. They turn these into poetry. 

C.S. Lewis’s That Hideous Strength provides the model for using dreams in narrative writing. After a discussion of the purpose of dreams in Lewis’s tale, class members craft a story in which their dreams play an essential role.

Students create poems and sound compositions using instruments, sounds, and pictograph notation. After listening Debussy's Children's corner suite, they brainstorm a list of snow vocabulary words. Students write poems and in groups...

The fifth installment in a writing unit that culminates with a Hyperstudio illustrated group story project, this plan is ripe with ideas for ways to design group writing projects for elementary writers. Use the whole unit as a base from...

Incorporating To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, narrative writing, and friendly letters, this lesson is ideal for any number of units in your classroom. First, read chapter 10 of the novel, noting Scout and Jem's reactions to their...