Seventh graders study events leading to, during and resulting from the American Revolution. They review elements of a political cartoon. They create and dramatize a scene from a Revolutionary War novel.

Students visit Ellis Island Immigration Museum (as a field trip or a virtual visit) and pretend to be Italian immigrants to the United States. They write a journal entry detailing their first week in the United States. They interview an...

Students work in a group to design a travel brochure and television commercial for an Italian resort. They role-play having inherited a large sum of money and buying an Italian villa to turn into a resort. Students research geography,...

¡Hola! Young learners need to review basic greetings and numbers the first week of school. To introduce learners to each other, have the kids form two circles, one inside the other. The inside circle faces out (so that they're...

Students explore the language of Shakespeare. In this literature lesson plan, students examine words invented by Shakespeare as they interpret their meanings in drawings. Students pantomime the meanings and then write a short story...

Students explore characterization in Little Women. In this literature lesson, students participate in written analysis and research in order to explore Alcott's characterization in the novel.

Mark Twain's life, politics, writing, and role as a mirror of pre- and post-Civil War American culture are the focus 11th and 12th graders in this section from an expansive author study. A critical writing assignment comparing Twain...

Make The Taming of the Shrew modern and relevant with this outline. Small groups can choose from a list of suggested scenes and update with modern language and settings before acting them out. Great questions refine writing and...

What defines an argument, and how can someone properly formulate a counterargument? This resource provides two options—an interactive PowerPoint presentation or worksheet—that will support your learners as they begin to explore how to...

Encourage class members to become engaged citizens by researching an issue they are passionate about and then producing a video to present to policymakers, the public, and their peers. Everything needed for the unit is contained in...

For many people, Barack Obama's presidency was the next step in Martin Luther King, Jr's dream of America's future. Explore the dreams of Americans past and present, as well as the young Americans in your class, with a set of activities...

Leonardo da Vinci is the focus of a hands-on activity that encourages scholars to become inventors. Pupils brainstorm and sketch their idea, compose a detailed depiction using a mirror writing technique, and antique the paper for a...

A cork, a rubber snake, and a bucket of mud may not seem like the best materials for washing a car, but they are in The Twits. The fifth lesson in an 11-part unit designed to accompany The Twits by Roald Dahl has readers role play...

Shakespeare's plays may be old, but they still have relevant lessons for today's world! A collection of lesson plans uses examples from The Merchant of Venice and District Merchants to teach about bravery. In addition to learning...

The inevitability of World War II has arrived: Berlin has fallen. Young historians watch contemporaneous footage of the event, analyze primary source documents, and write a news report that details the roles of the Soviet, British,...

Here is a complex lesson plan that interweaves the history of the Jim Crow South and the Great Migration with the study of poetry, art, and blues music from the Harlem Renaissance. The plan helps young historians develop a deep...

Students define the parts of a database, search strategies to locate information electronically, create/modify databases, etc. and enter data into a prepared spreadsheet to perform calculations.

Here is a fabulous, five-page lesson plan on how keywords can help a reader with his/her reading comprehension. After a teacher-led discussion, pupils pair off with each other and work together to identify the main idea in a passage of...

Young scholars explore Stephen Sondheim's contributions to musical theatre in the context of the dramatic cultural shift that occurred in American life in the late 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s.

Use drama techniques to recreate the story, Alexander and the Wind-Up Mouse by Leo Lionni. They engage in problem-solving as they identify the roles they will fufill in their groups for the performance. This is a motivating way to...

Students examine how story telling using literary elements found in fairy tale genre is one way to read and retell, discuss and analyze, as well as write and produce their own fairy tales.

Students discover that the education of the Aboriginal was a government and church "mission." They develop respect for the Aboriginal people and their continuing concerns about their treatment at the hands of the missionaries and the...