What's the most popular music style in Brazil? What about Cuba? Or the Dominican Republic? An immersive project teaches young learners about the salsa, the samba, and the merengue with research assignments and dance performances.

Young composers demonstrate their understanding of the stylistic features of descriptive music, including pitch, tempo, dynamics, rhythm, and timbre, by developing a melody and countermelody for a main character in a story. As part of...

How do the experiences of animals living in zoos differ from animals living in the wild? To prepare for a performance assessment on this question, class members are introduced to key concepts and vocabulary, and then groups use a Venn...

Cerebrum, cerebellum, brainstem, pituitary gland, and spinal cord. Prepare your class for a performance task assessment on the brain and how it works with a scripted plan that defines these terms and identifies the functions the...

What's the best way to learn the elements of the periodic table? The inventions of Thomas Edison? Patience? To prepare for the performance task assessment on how people learn, class members share ideas about ways to learn in a variety of...

What features do scientists use to classify animals into groups? Class groups examine a series of paired images of vertebrates (a bass and a trout, a toad and a newt, a crocodile and a tortoise, an owl and a robin, a tiger and a bear)...

Introduce the logic behind a dichotomous key or administer a group performance assessment with a fun and challenging classification lesson. With explicit instructions for the teacher and for collaborative groups, as well as engaging...

Young performing artists create a song or choreograph a dance to illustrate a theme in a text they are reading. Step-by-step directions are included.

Hey, enough frabbajabba about that stool pigeon, Daddy-O! Using the West Side Story study guide, scholars explore the language of the play and read about its historical associations and themes. Pupils also engage in a Spectrum of...

Explore self and social construction with a hands-on art project. After studying and discussing bullying and other social experiences, individuals create three paper dolls that represent specific social constructions. Included here is a...

Young musicians demonstrate their knowledge of the bass clef staff and prepare for an assessment  by completing a fill-in-the-blanks worksheet

Build your own Spanish unit about family and friends with these assessments and activities! Included here are several summative assessments to choose from and many activity ideas, cross-curricular tasks, and formative assessments...

Forty percent of food in the US goes uneaten while 14.5 percent of US households lack a secure supply of food. As part of the preparation for a performance task assessment, groups consider statistics such as these about food waste and...

Pathogens, what they are, how they spread, and how to prevent them from spreading are the focus of this resource that can be used to prepare learners for a performance task assessment or to begin the study of communicable diseases.

To prepare for a performance task assessment, class members review the stages of the water cycle and then individuals assume the roles of drops of water for a Reader's Theater exercise. The script, a graphic depicting the water...

To prepare for the Exploring the World Performance Task, class groups generate a list of places they would like to explore, examine images of seven natural wonders of the world, and consider why these sites are wondrous. A map and images...

Distinguishing between and understanding the purpose of landmarks and monuments is the focus a short activity designed to provide all learners with the context of a performance task. Images of the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial, the...

To establish a context for an assessment or a study of pioneers and the American frontier in the 1800s, groups examine photos and record observations about clothing, housing, and travel.

To appreciate the value of seeing and hearing a poetry performance, groups prepare readings of selected poems and then compare and critique their interpretations and videotaped versions of the same poem. Included in the resource are...

Historically, members of the upper class provide plenty of fodder for comedic writers. Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest is no exception, and a study guide for the classic play discusses some of the Victorian social...

Ensure that all class members understand the basic concepts and vocabulary they need to complete a performance task on thunderstorms with an activity that asks them to use a Venn diagram to compare thunderstorms with rainy days.

Building an accelerometer app for your Android device. Groups develop an app that uses the accelerometer on an Android device. The purpose of the activity is to reinforce the programming design. The post activity assessment challenges...

Let's hope that your soap is doing what it's supposed to! The second of six installments in the Cells unit has scholars perform an experiment cultivating bacteria in Petri dishes. They test soaps and detergents to see which is most...

How high will it bounce? Groups determine the height different balls bounce off of different surfaces. By performing the necessary calculations, they determine the initial and final momentum of the balls. The included worksheet provides...