Students examine the challenges of a new language and culture. In this cultural lesson, student read Running by Peter Hessler and discuss obstacles faced, including the language barrier. Students write an essay about a time they...

Class members may "think themselves accurs'd" when they first hear of an assignment that asks them to create a motivational speech. After studying the Saint Crispin's Day speech from Shakespeare's Henry V; however, they will count...

Imagine living in the hold of a sailing ship for 63 days, enduring rough seas and autumn storms. As part of a study of the voyage of the Mayflower, class members examine an online resource that details life about the ship, watch a slide...

For kids who love movies, figuring out a schedule for the maximum number that can be seen in one day is not only a good demonstration of Common Core mathematical practices, but also a highly motivating activity. Robert Kaplinsky...

Keep class members accountable for their own learning with a series of differentiated instruction strategies. From rubrics created by pupils to learning contracts written at the beginning of the year, the resource offers multiple ways...

The first instructional activity of a five-instructional activity unit designed for eighth graders has class members reading and watching a video of Edgar Allen Poe's narrative poem, "The Raven." They then craft their narrative poem,...

When we think of ocean exploration, many of us have visions of sunken pirate ships full of treasure or mysterious creatures of the deep. What really motivates deep-sea investigation? The first in a series of diverse six-part lessons...

Learners make predictions and draw conclusions from given information as they learn the meaning of probability in this vocabulary-rich, integrated activity that presents a variety of teaching strategies to motivate and reach...

Third graders use addition to create numbers that are palindromes and organize their results to look for patterns. They make generalizations from patterns and practice reading large numbers and addition with regrouping.

Fifth graders use formal geometric language to describe polygons (and other shapes) that will tessellate the plane and those that will not. Students make generalizations about the characteristics of a polygon (or other shape) that will...

Fifth graders use interlocking cubes to build towers to represent factors of numbers and place the towers in the appropriate places on a Tower chart in order to look for patterns. They work in partner groups, and finish by writing...

Third graders roll a die seven times, each time determining whether to add that number of tens or that number of ones to try to make a sum as close to 100 as possible without going over.

What's the difference between a diary and a memoir? Young historians explore the ramifications of this question as they learn how to use primary source materials to gain an understanding of life on the Texas frontier.

Young historians discover the experiences of runaway slaves after reading the brief biography and narrative excerpt of Henry "Box" Brown, who escaped slavery by having himself shipped away in a crate and popularized his...

The Articles of Confederation sounds like one big, fancy title to middle schoolers. Here, scaffolded steps help to ease novices into understanding this all-important American document. Discussion questions, activity activities, and ideas...

Second graders collect data by spinning two spinners and creating sums, organize the data, and make conclusions from the data. Each students makes a spinner. They spin and record the number of the section each time. Students work in...

Fifth graders collect and organize data from writing samples, use fractions and decimals to describe the experimental data, and use the experimental results to make predictions about the frequency of letter usage in the English language.

Use the fairy tale Rumpelstiltskin to teach your third grade class about descriptive writing. Following a teacher read-aloud of the story, the class brainstorms a list of adjectives describing the main character. Students use this list...

Pupils examine similarities and differences between cultures. They'll see that literature, reading, and story telling is something all cultures have in common. They should construct Venn diagrams to help them compare and contrast the...

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...

Students study the similarities and differences between their school and a school in Korea. In this culture study lesson, students discuss and list their classroom's weekly schedule. Students then read about a Korean class schedule and...

Middle schoolers review and reinforce the concepts of mean, median, and mode based on the number of siblings the students have. They use Post-it notes to organize and re-organize the data.

How does our moral reasoning shape our identity? After a study of Kohlberg's Levels of Moral Reasoning, readers use Kohlberg's theories to analyze the speech, thoughts, and decisions of a character in A Separate Peace. They then...

Young scholars plan healthy lunches and how to dispose of their lunch waste. In this pre-field trip lesson, students and teachers plan healthy, nutritious lunches to bring on a field trip. They also discuss how to sort their garbage into...