Writing
Curated OER

Poems: calligrams

For Students 1st - 3rd Standards
Have fun with shape poems! First and second graders write calligrams that add to the meaning of their poems. Great for your poetry unit or if you want to combine poetry and art lessons. 
Activity
Curated OER

The Value of Education

For Teachers 5th Standards
The real value of education is highlighted in more than one way on a worksheet designed to not only add, subtract, multiply, and divide decimals to hundredths, but also to address the correlation between higher pay...
App
Qrayon

Inkflow: Think Visually!

For Teachers Pre-K - 12th
Save trees! Save graphite! Save ink! Go paperless! Make a list, mindmap, sketch an idea. Import, scale, rotate, and add text to images. Save content into books and share your creations. All this and more is yours with a free visual...
Handout
Grammar Bytes

Rules For Using Irregular Verbs

For Students 2nd - 5th Standards
Add to the grammar toolboxes of young scholars with this comprehensive resource on irregular verbs. Offering clear instruction with the help of numerous examples, this reference document is perfect for upper-elementary English...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Planting a Rainbow Bulletin Board

For Teachers K
Students explore a variety of colors and shapes after reading the story, "Planting A Rainbow," by Lois Ehlert. The tracking and reading of labels attached to diagrams form an experience in vocabulary development in this lesson.
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Hubris Lesson Plan

For Teachers 7th - 9th
Bring this lesson on hubris to your short story unit. After reading Jack London's "To Build a Fire," young readers discuss the role of hubris in the protagonist's death. The lesson has connections to other short stories, such as "The...
Lesson Plan
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Scholastic

Women's Suffrage for Grades 6–8

For Teachers 6th - 8th Standards
Learners study the decisions and solutions involved in winning the right to vote. After reading background information on the fight for women's suffrage, including one woman's story, and its eventual success in the United States and...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Stolen Smell

For Teachers 2nd
Second graders read the story The Stolen Smell and participate in many language arts based activity connected to the story. They participate in discussions, vocabulary work, analyzing the story, public speaking, illustrating pictures,...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer: "Chalk Talk Strategy”

For Teachers 7th - 10th
Hold a silent discussion about concepts related to The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. After reading chapter seven, learners participate in a whole-class written discussion based on guiding questions written on the board by the teacher. 
Activity
Curated OER

Express Yourself Lesson Seed 11: Setting

For Teachers 6th Standards
Encourage your learners to examine the setting in Theodore Taylor's The Cay. Pupils work in small groups to put together a description of the setting before reading two more chapters of the book. They use their double-entry journals to...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Keywords: A Memorization Strategy

For Teachers 4th - 6th
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...
Lesson Plan
ReadWriteThink

Martin Luther King, Jr. and Me: Identifying with a Hero

For Teachers K - 2nd
Here, young historians compare their early lives to that of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s. They listen to a read aloud of a story by Dr. King's sister, and then write in the provided reflective journal template. Lastly, they share their...
Lesson Plan
Vanderbilt University

Stories from the Panama Canal

For Teachers 6th - 8th Standards
The stories of the Silver People, the West Indies immigrants hired to work on the Panama Canal, come to life in a lesson about the building of the Panama Canal. Groups research why the canal was built, how it was build, the working...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

What a Character!

For Teachers 5th - 8th
Middle schoolers read a novel and discuss character personality. First, they analyze a character in a novel and keep a chart or web of the character's identity, which includes specific examples from the book. They then write a script...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

What's in the Time Capsule? A Technology-Connected Lesson Plan

For Teachers 12th
Twelfth graders use computers and the Internet to research a specified area, word processors to prepare an essay, a digital camera, a video camera gather visuals, and a scanner to add visuals to a PowerPoint presentation as they discover...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Dental Detectives

For Teachers 1st
First graders explore the theme of dental health and hygeine. They make tooth loss predictions, count lost teeth, and graph tooth loss. In addition, they listen to dental health stories, read online stories, create spreadsheets, and play...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

My Secret War: Lesson 5

For Teachers 5th
Fifth graders determine how freedom comes with rights and responsibilities through literature and poetry about World War II. In this World War II lesson, 5th graders use the letters in the word "infamy" to write an acrostic poem. They...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Counting Up/Down Stories

For Teachers 6th - 10th
Mirroring Jerry Spinelli's style in Wringer, chapter 5, pupils use the "counting up/down technique" to recall an important moment in their lives. In the book, the character is being punched, and between blows he remembers details...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

"User Friendly" Cause and Effect

For Teachers 7th - 8th
Bring literature to life with your SMART board and this literary analysis lesson. While reading "User Friendly" by T. Ernesto Bethancourt (from the Holt Elements of Literature textbook by Kylene Beers), have your class discuss the theme...
Lesson Plan
Shakespeare in American Life

"Strike a Pose:" Music and Vogueing in The Winter's Tale

For Teachers 11th - 12th
After class members have read and discussed Act III of The Winter’s Tale, groups select one line from Act III, scene i that they feel captures the essence of the entire scene. They then create a tableaux that best depicts the scene’s...
Worksheet
Curated OER

Measure for Measure: Anticipation Guide

For Students 10th - 12th Standards
Be bold and never fearful! Tempt your scholars with an Anticipation Guide for Measure for Measure. Before reading Shakespeare’s problem play, class members label a series of statements as either true or false in their opinion. (It’s okay...
Writing
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Curated OER

Using Figurative Language

For Students 4th - 8th
Adding details and figurative language makes any story more fun to read! After reading two versions of the same story, one devoid of figurative language and one embellished, young writers are asked to add alliteration, hyperbole,...
Assessment
BPE

Teacher Guide for Faster Passage: "Sympathy" and "Caged Bird" Poetry

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Prepare class members for formative assessments of student thinking in reading (FAST-R) with a resource that compares Paul Laurence Dunbar's "Sympathy" and Maya Angelou's "Caged Bird." Readers respond to 10 multiple choice questions and...
Worksheet
Read Works

Cool to Be Kind

For Students 5th Standards
Make a connection between empathy and bullying with a reading passage that has readers thinking about other people's feelings. After reading, learners respond to ten reading comprehension questions involving short answer and multiple...