EngageNY
Using Effective Search Terms: Researching Water Management
Discover how to use search terms effectively! Scholars continue their exploration of Charles Fishman's The Big Thirst, engaging in a read aloud and then answering text-based questions. Next, pupils learn about using search terms and...
Curated OER
Eat Your Fruits and Vegetables
Students will discuss the benefits of eating healthy. In this healthy diet lesson, students will discuss the importance of eating fresh fruit and vegetables when pregnant or breastfeeding and how to identify healthy fruits and...
Curated OER
"More Than One"
Help your class learn the spelling rule for adding -es to plural nouns and third-person singular verbs. The resource suggests using songs daily to reinforce the rules. The songs are contained in a Sing Your Way Through Phonics 2-CD set...
Curated OER
Cultivating Caring - Filling Buckets of Caring Carrots
Students practice compassion. In this character education lesson, student read Have You Filled a Bucket Today? by Carol McCloud. Students discuss the book as well as ways to demonstrate they care for one another. Students fill buckets...
Poets.org
Ghosts and Spirits
Connect poetry to a naturally kid-friendly topic: ghosts! Draw on your class's prior knowledge of the paranormal to help them access the classic poem "Haunted House" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. After a fun warm-up activity describing...
Curated OER
Movie Maker: Retelling a Story
Using Movie Maker, sixth graders make an eight frame movie based on a story they have written. They choose music clips, select pictures from PowerPoint, and make their movie. The lesson should take about ten days to complete.
Curated OER
Homemade Holidays
Foster your high schoolers' creativity - and generosity - with this writing lesson. After reading the article "Homemade Holiday Gifts" by Frances Janisch (from the GALE Student Resource Center - Gold), pupils meet in groups to brainstorm...
Curated OER
Lincoln is in the House! ("Name-Dropping" Poems and the Power of Connotation)
“What’s in a name?” Just about everything. Barack Obama, Vincent van Gogh, Justin Bieber. Famous names evoke a multitude of reactions and poets often use the names of famous people in their works precisely because names carry...
Curated OER
Book Trailers/Sneak Peeks
Looking for a motivating and creative technology lesson? Then this lesson is for you! After viewing a movie trailer, middle-schoolers follow that design to create a video preview of a book's story elements. They also create a storyboard...
Curated OER
Go Fish For Blends and Digraphs
Youngsters practice using blends and digraphs. In this early reading lesson, students play a game of "Go Fish" using words that contain a blend or digraph. This allows them to practice recognizing the word and using it in a sentence.
Curated OER
Big Snowball Fight
Learners complete pre reading, writing, during reading, and interdisciplinary activities for the book Big Snowball Fight. In this reading lesson plan, students complete journal entries, answer short answer questions, have discussions,...
Curated OER
In My World
Students identify base words and their inflectional forms. In this base words lesson plan, students learn how adding "ing" can change the meaning of the word, and they fill in a chart with different forms of base words.
Curated OER
Adjectives
Students add adjectives to a paragraph to make it more exciting and describing. For this adjectives lesson plan, students compare 2 paragraphs, one with adjectives and one without, and then add in their own to another paragraph.
Curated OER
First Day of Preschool
Young scholars discuss rules, have introductions, complete school tours, and more for the first day of preschool. In this first day of school lesson plan, students also discuss being good friends.
Curated OER
Fun With Chicka Chicka Boom Boom
Young scholars read the book Chicka Chicka Boom Boom and listen to the musical tape. Then they make their own coconut trees, adding their own letters. They express and record their favorite parts. All are displayed on a bulletin board.
Curated OER
Reading Fiction - Character
The goal of this lesson is to have learners understand how character is created through a combination of what they say and do, and what others say about them. In pairs, learners construct a short dialogue between a parent and child after...
Curated OER
Basic Writing Skills
Learners listen to story A Mason-Dixon Memory, by Clifton Davis, and complete worksheets about the story. The worksheets are embedded in the plan. This activity provides good reading comprehension practice for young readers.
Curated OER
If I Were An Animal
Students choose a favorite animal and identify its prominent characteristics. They draw their favorite animal adding their own heads to animal bodies. Then they write a creative, detailed short story about themselves as a nonsense creature.
Curated OER
Sentence Sense
Students determine several different types of appropriate punctuation, depending on intended meaning. They differentiate between possible meanings and expressions with added punctuation. Afterward, they work with a partner to create and...
Curated OER
Creepy Read Week
Here's a clever technology twist to writing in the round. Participants rotate through a series of computers adding to stories and editing by keystroke and mouse click. "Locked" forms prevent the loss of stories filled with suspense and...
Curated OER
Plain Polly: Adding Relevant Details
Students use a stick figure to help them learn to write with details. In this details lesson, students brainstorm details to add to the stick figure 'Plain Polly.' Students then draw stick figures for their own writing and give them a...
EngageNY
Creating a Graphic Novelette and Peer Critique: Sections 2, 3, and 4
Let's get creative! With the fun resource, pupils continue working on their graphic novelettes about an invention, adding text and images to each section. When finished, they engage in a peer critique process, giving and receiving...
National Endowment for the Humanities
The Beauty of Anglo-Saxon Poetry: A Prelude to Beowulf
Riddle me this! What do kennings, caesura, and alliteration have to do with the Nowell Codex? Introduce class members to Anglo-Saxon poetry and prepare readers for a study of Beowulf with a series of activities that includes asking...
Curated OER
Writing Pattern Books
Have your older students assist young children with writing in this community service and literacy lesson. Middle schoolers become partners with a local elementary school. They assist the grade school children in writing a pattern book...