Looking for a performance assessment that asks individuals to demonstrate their competency in writing about informational text? Use Frederick Douglass' essay "On the Dred Scott Decision," and an excerpt from Abraham Lincoln's 1857 speech...

To conclude their study of Out of the Dust, the 1998 Newbery Medal winning verse novel, individuals craft a narrative essay based on one of the themes in Karen Hesse's novel.

After researching an issue introduced in Tyson Miller's Dream of a Nation: Inspiring Ideas for a Better America, writers develop an original thesis statement and craft an analytic essay using evidence collected in their research.

The Grapes of Wrath. The Jungle. Native Son. The Things They Carried. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian. To address a current social, political, economic, or environmental issue, class groups pair the reading of a...

A three-minute exercise warms-up scholars' writing abilities in order to follow a writing process that ends in an essay. The essay's topic is a barrier and the values used to break it. Four steps include choosing a topic,...

No matter how difficult high school writing may seem, college writing presents challenges of its own. The fourth in a series of 24 handouts from The Writing Center at UNC breaks down the expectations for college writing. Scholars learn...

There's a lot riding on good writing! Often, an application essay is the difference between acceptance and rejection. As part of a series on specific writing assignments and contexts, a handout helps scholars craft the perfect personal...

All the tools (and directions) you’ll need  to build an essay are included in a resource designed for learners and educators. The packet can be given to class members or divided into sections and used as part of a series of lesson...

Should primary graders have their own computers? Should animals be kept in captivity? Young writers learn how to develop and support a claim in this short unit on persuasive writing.

Your parents were both in different countries. You were born in the US. Documents and application forms ask you to identify your racial or ethnic classification. Which box do you check? Class members collect documents...

When it comes to writing, cliches are as old as dirt. A handout on tired phrases provides examples of cliches, as well as a description of the negative effects they have on a paper. Writers discover specific words and phrases to avoid,...

“It was a miracle.” Basil Heatter’s “The Long Night of the Little Boats,” which details the miraculous rescue of the British army from the shores of Dunkirk in 1940, is featured in a series of exercises that ask class members to read,...

Scholars discuss the many ways they use persuasion in their everyday lives and brainstorm specific ideas for encouraging someone to do something. With the list of persuasive techniques they made, young writers complete a graphic...

Scholars examine the first Thanksgiving through books and interviews while they complete a KWL chart. Pretending they are part of the feast, learners craft a scrapbook page that features images related to their experience. Pupils reflect...

Scholars review prior knowledge before completing a hands-on simulation of the rock cycle. They write stories or songs summarizing their simulations to demonstrate mastery.

Imagine an entire course devoted to dystopian literature. If that concept appeals to you, check out this course that uses 1984 as the anchor text and includes classic short stories as well.

Persuade your writers that crafting arguments is not that difficult. They only need to follow the steps outlined in this resource.

As part of their exploration of the American dream, class members examine primary source materials to compare immigrant experiences of those arriving early in our country's history to those arriving in the US after World War...

In an ideal world, sentences in a college-level essay should feature a variety of sentence types. In reality, most papers stick to simple and compound sentences, two of the types a handout on sentence patterns discusses. Part of a larger...