Middle schoolers engage in a lesson which reminds them that root words indicate the base meaning of a word, and that those roots are found in many different words that have similar meanings. Pairs of pupils use construction paper and...

How have advances in technology and communication changed our world? That is the questions that world history students contemplate as they examine a series of primary and secondary source materials 

The murder of Emmett Till, the Selma to Montgomery march, and the desegregation of Boston schools are the focus of three units that ask class members to investigate why these events were so key in the struggle for civil rights....

What's missing from most studies of the American Revolutionary War is information about the role African Americans played in the conflict. To correct this oversight, middle schoolers research groups like the Black Loyalists and ...

Use the Visual Thesaurus to predict the subject matter of Rick Riordan's book The Lightning Thief. A pre-reading activity encourages middle schoolers to use context clues and word meaning to discover what the book is about. After...

Discover how to use prefixes and suffixes to determine the meaning of unfamiliar words. The group views a jovial video on the topic, and then they create a chart of prefix and suffix meanings to identify the meanings of words in a social...

Learners analyze the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights. In this U.S. government lesson plan, students examine books, movies, and music that influence them today and then investigate writings that influenced the framers of the...

The Paradise Papers, a year-long research project from the International Consortium of Investigative Journalism (ICIJ) exposed how political leaders, business people, and wealthy individuals used offshore entities to avoid taxes and hide...

A carefully crafted three-day instructional activity integrates poetry and visual art. By analyzing and comparing Langston Hughes' poem "Mother and Son" and Romare Bearden's collage "The Dove," readers explore the theme of hope. The...

Who has the power? The founding fathers asked the same question when the United States was formed. Learners explore issues that arose during Madison’s presidency that raised constitutional questions. Through discovery, discussion, and...

Students discover the defintion for synonyms and how they describe similar situations. They start with a common word such as "happy" and brainstorm different words that mean the same as happy. They draw pictures or write sentences to...

Young mathematicians research and discuss real world math word problems and ways in which they apply math concepts in their everyday lives. They create a storyboard of a math word problem from which they create a slide for a multi-media...

Brazil's population has been changing dramatically in the last century. Study the causes of Brazilian urbanization, including industrialization and and migration, and the implications for the country of the populations'...

Students examine the use of the Underground Railroad. In this Underground Railroad lesson, students determine the meaning of the word slavery. They study the Underground Railroad through the use of literature and Internet websites. They...

What do you call a tiny collection of galaxies? A puny-verse! Young scholars graph data gathered by scientists studying Cepheids. They attempt to identify a relationship between the variables through standard and logarithmical...

Explore the food chains that support Arctic ecosystems. A class discussion on interdependence and the different roles plants and animals play in ecosystems provides students with the knowledge to complete a worksheet asking them to...

Analyze and make inferences from the information used by linguists to construct the evolution of languages. They research different dating techniques to explain how scientists infer age with evidence.

Music is a universal pleasure, but writing about it can be a little trickier. An informative handout discusses common types of music writing assignments that one might encounter in a college-level course. Individuals read about musical...

Is the price of chocolate a good indicator of taste? Your learners will approach this question through experimentation and analysis, and will then delve into the rich history and complexity of cacao and chocolate.

Upper elementary schoolers examine the concept of synonyms and how using a variety of vocabulary through synonyms can expand their writing skills. They revise a paragraph using synonyms located on the Visual Thesaurus and participate in...

Learners identify geographical features of different regions encountered by migrants on the Oregon trail. Students research how the Oregon landscape may have affected life and 19th century westward migration. Learners write a narrative...

Identify and analyze the use of figurative language used in select pieces of writing. These pieces of literature will represent at least two pieces by one writer and at least two pieces by different writers. This lesson would be a great...

Your young historians will learn all about the pharaohs, pyramids, and gods of ancient Egypt with these informational text worksheets, each of which are accompanied by hands-on, follow-up activities.

Middle schoolers explore the parallel development and increasing complexity of writing and the growth of civilization in the Tigris and Euphrates valleys in ancient Mesopotamia.