Curated OER
Using Social Studies in Five Shared Reading Lessons: Geography
After several short 15-minute mini-lessons, your learners will gain an understanding of the characteristics of a non-fiction text. Using the book Map It by Elspeth Leacock, your class will become acquainted with non-fiction terms such as...
Curated OER
English Lesson Plans for Grade 12
HIgh schoolers respond to a persuasive article on using animal research. In this english lesson, writers listen to a conversation, and discuss the point of arguments. They write a critique on a certain film and share it with their...
Curated OER
Lesson Learned: Creating a Life Reports Project
Tap into the wisdom and knowledge of older members of the community with this New York Times plan. To warm up, learners write about and discuss advice they have been given. After reading "The Life Report," an op-ed column that asks older...
Curated OER
Left-to-Right Reading
Left-to-right, left-to-right, that's the way we read and write! Watch this short video clip and teach your young learners this chant before they start writing!
Newseum
Is This Story Share-Worthy?
Young journalists use a "Is This Story Share-Worthy?" flowchart graphic to decide whether a story is worth sharing online. Instructors provide groups with fake news, poor quality stories, opinion pieces, biased news, and high-quality...
Penguin Books
Core Curriculum Lesson Plans for Jefferson's Sons
Thomas Jefferson lived a controversial life. A series of lesson plans shares information about Jefferson's Sons, a novel about the infamous founding father. Discussion questions and other tasks explore different points of view and cover...
EngageNY
Reading and Taking Notes on Colonial Trades
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...
Historical Thinking Matters
Spanish-American War: 3 Day Lesson
Why did the United States choose to invade Cuba in 1898? As part of a 3-day activity, your young historians will first develop working hypotheses to answer this question, then work with a variety of historical primary source documents...
Benjamin Franklin Tercentenary
Benjamin Franklin and Learning a Lesson
Examine stories with a moral in a character development instructional activity. The class reads a short story written by Benjamin Franklin in which he pays too much for a toy whistle. Individuals then make text-to-self connections and...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Lesson 3: What Happens in the White House? A Timeline
Working in groups or individually, learners study images of important events that occurred at, or directly affected, the White House, and share their findings of a specific event. They then post the image of their event on a timeline of...
Curated OER
A Taste of Blackberries
Fourth graders participate in a shared reading of Doris Buchanan's, A Taste of Blackberries. They read about grief in the loss of a best friend and examine the skills of a responsible family member.
Curated OER
Reading Restaurant
Third graders complete book reports. They are given the following jobs; chef, who organizes them into genres; maître d', who calls students to share the menu; and waiters/waitresses, who take orders for books from customers, pass out...
Curated OER
Under Construction
Young readers examine the elements of story structure that are included in all stories. They include these elements in their own written pieces. This phenomenally-designed plan has everything you need to easily implement it in your...
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Surprise!: Challenge Activities (Theme 2)
Surprise! is the theme of this series of challenge activities. The surprise comes from the information your scholars will discover when researching topics such as alligators and crocodiles, living in other countries, becoming a...
EngageNY
Launching Researching: Reading for Gist and Gathering Evidence Using the Research Guide
Let's get to the gist! Pupils work in research teams to gather information about specific refugee experiences from Bosnia, Afghanistan, and Kurdistan. Scholars then try to find the gist of informational texts about their topics,...
Curated OER
A Lesson To Accompany "The First Bank of the United States: A Chapter in the History of Central Banking"
Here is an interesting topic. Learners examine the economics that led to the founding of the First Bank of America. They participate in a reader's theater experience depicting the debate between Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson...
Curated OER
Lesson Mystery: The Game is Afoot
Students enter and experience the world of Sherlock Holmes and hard-boiled detectives in this unit on mysteries. They review and analyze the ""Whodunit Requirements" and the "Mystery Contract" that accompany this instructional activity....
Curated OER
EFL Lesson Plan: How to Teach EFL/ESL Students Interview Skills
Explore communication in this interview skills lesson. English learners identify the techniques native English speakers use when speaking directly to a potential employer. They read handouts detailing seven steps to improve an interview...
Curated OER
A Hurricane Blowing In
Students write a scene. In this creative writing instructional activity, students read The Lightning Thief and discuss the sentence fluency and word choice in the writing. Students complete a writing assignment where they create an...
Curated OER
A Monster of a Metaphor
What do Jeep advertisements and Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath have in common? They both employ the art of the extended metaphor! Using the Six-Trait Writing model, learners begin to work on their own extended metaphors. Development...
Curated OER
Author Study: Cynthia Rylant
Explore the life's work of one of the great children's authors using this ten-lesson author study unit. After first performing some whole-group research into the life of Cynthia Rylant, the class goes on to read six different stories,...
American Forest Foundation
Who Speaks for the Trees?
Help young conservationists appreciate the important role that trees play in ecosystems around the world with this collection of six engaging activities. From a shared reading and class discussion of Dr. Seuss' The Lorax, to in an depth...
Curated OER
Lesson: Creating With A Purpose
Discovering the creative process can be done through critical analysis. Upper graders examine a hand -carved Shinto Deity, discussing purpose, technique, and artistic expression. They then read a poem about the creative process. and...
Mary Pope Osborne, Classroom Adventures Program
Mummies in the Morning Egyptian pyramids, hieroglyphics
Visit the Magic Treehouse and take your class on a trip through time with a reading of the children's book Mummies in the Morning. Using the story to spark an investigation into Egyptian culture, this literature unit engages...