Practice the strategy of summarizing to gain meaning and knowledge from an informational text. Young readers highlight supporting details and main ideas, and then they use this to summarize two articles: "The Great Quake" and "What...

The emotional and spiritual oppression of slavery in the African-American experience is the focus of this lesson plan. Middle schoolers analyze various texts by Frederick Douglass and Maya Angelou related to freedom and...

A handy TFDC (topic/fact/detail/conclusion) graphic organizer (included) allows young writers to outline and record their main ideas and supporting details in the prewriting phase. They then continue to add details to the topic sentences...

In 1856 Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina beat Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts over the head with a cane. This event, which highlighted the acrimonious debate over the expansion of slavery, is the focus of a paper...

Give your WWI study collaborative energy using a group research project. Groups are assigned one of the six main themes (included). Each group has an outline to guide research but will need an assignment guide. Consider supplementing the...

A great idea for showing language arts pupils the universality of themes, even in the real world! Have class members choose an idea-noun (peace, justice, war, love, etc.) at the beginning of the year or semester. They complete weekly...

Imagine a list that includes Alan Abelson of Baron's, Bob Woodward of the Washington Post, and Mother Jones. High schoolers select a national columnist, read and annotate five columns by this author, noting the rhetorical...

For classes tackling To Kill a Mockingbird, this lesson plan sets readers up for discussions or essay writing with questions and prompts. The prompts encourage individuals to explore beyond the novel itself, looking at...

How can something be true even if it didn't happen? Invite your classes to investigate the truths found in the world of magical realism as they analyze short stories, poems, informational texts, video, and art from this genre.

Encourage readers to determine if Hamlet's madness is actually divinest sense. Class members analyze the words of the play before studying related texts, including T.S. Eliot's "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," scenes from...

Almost every ancient culture observed the stars and saw pictures in the patterns. Studying stars allowed them to guide travelers, determine when to plant crops, when to harvest food, and the stories surrounding the images include some of...

The sixth lesson plan in this Bullfrog at Magnolia Circle unit assesses your third graders' ability to read and understand informational text. The included assessment asks learners to take notes about the main idea and supporting...

Students observe the sounds of different brass instruments in order to understand how to create different pitches. In this musical instructional activity, students create a "brass" instrument from everyday household objects. The students...

In instructional activity 13 of this unit on colonial trade, young researchers learn about apprentices as they prepare to write help-wanted ads for the specific trade they have been researching. To begin, the class listens closely as the...

As a summative assessment for this unit on colonial trade, fourth graders listen to and read informational texts in order to demonstrate their ability to take notes, write summaries, and draw connections. Young scholars first listen as...

Fourth graders work in small groups to become experts on different colonial trades in the eighth instructional activity of this unit. Working toward the long-term goal of writing a piece of historical fiction, young scholars read...

As your class reaches the end of the book Bullfrog at Magnolia Circle, the seventh lesson in this literary unit helps third graders transition from reading narrative to expository writing. Scholars develop their note-taking skills...

Fourth graders view examples of help-wanted ads as they plan and create their own writing in the fourteenth instructional activity of this unit on colonial trade. The engagement of the class is captured when the teacher shares an actual...

If it's on the Internet, it must be true—right? How can someone tell if a website contains less-than-truthful information? Savvy surfers evaluate sources in the fifth of a six-part college and career readiness instructional activity...

In the tenth instructional activity of this unit, young scholars learn to categorize information as they continue researching their colonial trade. During guided practice, the teacher models how to read informational text slowly while...

Stop, thief! Do your pupils understand the consequences of plagiarism? Lesson three of six in a series of college and career readiness activities demonstrates the dangers of taking credit for someone else's work. Learners engage in...

There are so many ways to be smart! Can your class identify their intelligences? The third of five career and college lesson plans designed for sixth graders challenges them to assess their unique skills. Once they determine their...

Middle schoolers complete a writing assessment task to demonstrate their ability to craft a narrative based on a variety of informational texts. They view West of the West's documentary Magic Isle, read three print resources about...

What can young scientists discover from dissecting an owl pellet? Explore the owl food chain, beginning with an introduction to these predatory birds. Suggested strategies here include creating a podcast and purchasing a poster, however...