Guide your class through a reading of the popular children's book, Frindle, with this comprehensive literature unit. Starting with a brief introduction to the guided reading process, the class goes on to read the story two chapters...

Want to boost your readers' comprehension skills and strategies? Look to these five pages, each with a short story and questions to answer covering main idea, facts, sequence of events, context clues, conclusions, and making...

Readers practice gathering textual evidence to support their understanding of character point of view in A Long Walk to Water by Linda Sue Park. Working with partners, they complete a Gathering Evidence graphic organizer and engage in...

Stick it to them! Scholars work to write the gist of sections of text on sticky notes and place them in chapter three of The Lightning Thief. They then share what they wrote with classmates in their triad. The group reads selections of...

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...

It's all about perspective! Using the resource, scholars read a third excerpt from Laurence Yep's autobiography, The Lost Garden. As they read, individuals complete graphic organizers using clues from the text to infer the author's...

Partner up! After an I have/who has activity, readers partner with one of their discussion appointments to add evidence from chapters 11-13 in To Kill a Mockingbird to the Atticus Note-catcher. Partners then share with the class and add...

How do you know what a character's personality is like if an author doesn't tell you? With a focus on character development in Esperanza Rising, pupils complete a jigsaw activity to analyze the actions of Mama, Abuelita, and Miguel. Once...

Do students really need to be taught how to read cartoons, comic books, and comic strips? Yes. Just as they need to learn how to read other forms of graphic text such as diagrams, photos, timetables, maps, charts, and tables. Young...

A 10-page guide to John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men includes a brief plot summary, information about preparing readers for the language in the novel, pre-reading, during reading, and post-reading questions, essay prompts, and project...

“An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” Ambrose Bierce’s short story, is used to model how structural moves, the decisions an author makes about setting, point of view, time order, etc., can be examined to reveal an author’s purpose. Groups...

Read the story The Great Smelly, Slobbery, Small-Tooth Dog: A Folktale from Great Britain by Margaret Read MacDonald and choose from multiple activities to learn about the tale's theme—kindness. With so many options, your kind kids will...

In the first lesson plan of this unit on colonial trade, fourth graders gain background knowledge of different jobs performed by early colonists. The class begins with a slide show presentation that includes a variety of great...

A study of Jan Felipe Herrera's poem "Every Day We Get More Illegal" opens the door for a discussion on immigration. To begin, class members examine the photograph "Desert Survival," record their observations of the image, and then...

Good discussion questions, quizzes, and tests teach as well as assess. Readers of The Great Gatsby will learn much from the materials in a 36-page packet designed to help students prepare for the AP Literature exam. Included in the...

Using the paintings On to Liberty and A Ride for Liberty, 10th graders analyze historical perspectives on life after the Civil War. They attempt to determine what the Civil War meant for free slaves, then read a paragraph highlighting...

Engage further in Esperanza Rising with a focus on close reading and metaphor. Class members zero in on the tenth chapter, examining characters and big ideas. Pupils discuss the text in small groups and as a whole class, and...

Explore multiple perspectives through a jigsaw activity that will improve your pupils' understanding of the characters in Esperanza Rising as well as their understanding of strikes and human rights. Tapping into prior knowledge, and...

Readers of  Lord of the Flies hunt down direct and indirect examples of how William Golding brings his characters to life. After instructors guide learners through the process of collecting evidence of these two types of...

Imagine what life might be like in a different galaxy. That's the challenge young scientists take on in a warm-up activity designed to prepare them for a close reading of Ruth Stone's poem "In the Next Galaxy." After class members share...

Scholars investigate and discuss the importance of values and how they can be used to break barriers. Small groups work collaboratively to examine the text and draw inferences to answer questions. A writing assignment challenges pupils...

Kurt Vonnegut's short story "Harrison Bergeron" engages adolescents with its theme about the dangers of complete societal equality. Learners complete a graphic organizer to track literary elements in the story, as well as an inference...

A 3-day exam assesses readers' comprehension. After hearing a passage from the story Kittens First Full Moon by Kevin Henkes, scholars work with a partner to discuss and sketch what they found memorable. Peers share their final products...

Sometimes what you get is far more than what you first see. The third routine in the Building Community series asks participants to engage in a See, Think, Wonder strategy. Small groups analyze a projected image, infer what is happening,...