After re-reading The Omnivore’s Dilemma using a Reading Closely: Guiding Questions handout, class members use sticky notes to annotate and determine the gist of the text. Finally, they use an Author’s Purpose graphic organizer to...

Build beautiful books in whatever style you'd like with an intuitive and adaptable app for constructing books. Kids can add images, drawings, text, and audio to make books about any subject. When complete, learners can wrap up the...

If you're searching for a way to keep your class informed of current psychology news, this ongoing assignment is both educational and engaging. Class members locate and read a psychology article of interest, write a psychological...

Connect with the text using helpful annotation strategies. As your class reads the first section of Karen Russell's short story, "St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves," they note important passages that establish character...

Eager readers have waited a long time, very patiently, for a set of literary analysis lessons that connect text structure to the work's central idea. As ninth graders continue reading "The Tell-Tale Heart," they focus on the central...

Delve into the heart of dramatic dialogue with a unit focused on Oedipus the King by Sophocles. Having completed an online exploration about ancient Greece beforehand, ninth graders read the play's opening lines and analyze how...

The intricate craft of narrative writing can make a happy story feel exuberant or a sad story feel devastating. With 42 extensive lessons that include poignant discussion questions, standards-aligned self-reflections, engaging writing...

Use essential elements cards to help lesson plan! Each card contains an informational text common core standard for grade levels six through eight and suggestions for activities and supports. Cards address skills such as citing textual...

Read and reread for better understanding. Scholars listen to a read aloud of Shrouded in Myth. They talk with a partner about the things they noticed and wondered about the text. They then listen to the text a second time to focus...

Where did the falcons go? Scholars read the article Welcome Back which describes the disappearance of falcons due to the use of pesticides. During a second read, learners annotate the text by marking unfamiliar words and facts about...

Make up your mind to complete a lesson plan about "The Tell-Tale Heart" and forever rid yourself of simple sentence structures. As ninth graders analyze the first two paragraphs of Edgar Allan Poe's short story, they consider how text...

Finish your unit on Temple Grandin's Animals in Translation with a two-part written assessment. As ninth graders refer to their notes, annotations, and discussion guides from the first part of the unit, they prepare for a writing prompt...

Hearken! and observe how well a literary analysis unit can help ninth graders read closely and connect text structure to a central idea. Focusing on Edgar Allan Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart," learners take notes and track the development...

Continue analyzing literature using textual evidence with a instructional activity on "I Felt A Funeral, in my Brain" by Emily Dickinson. Ninth graders bring their annotation skills and knowledge of figurative language from the previous...

Once conceived, a guided set of literary analysis lessons will assist you day and night. Ninth graders look closely at "The Tell-Tale Heart" and analyze how Poe uses point of view to create questions about the narrator's sanity and...

What would Ben do? Jumping off from the pseudonymous letters Ben Franklin fooled his older brother into publishing when he was still a teenager, young literary lovers dive into acting, writing, and addressing a local issue with wit and...

Although the article that launches this instructional activity is about the history of the Periodic Table, the objective is reading comprehension. Using the eight-page informational text, learners answer five comprehension questions and...

Readers consider comparisons between the Dinka and Nuer tribes in South Sudan, making connections between an informational article about Sudanese tribes and the novel A Long Walk to Water by Linda Sue Park. They annotate the text to help...

Develop the techniques needed to analyze and synthesize literature well. No matter what students read, they need to be able to think critically about the material. Give thinkers these tools to effectively ponder and consider the world...

That's a double whammy! Scholars read the excerpt Double Whammy from The Exterminator. After identifying the gist of the text, they annotate by marking the author's claim. The group discusses what is meant by double whammy and...

Strong writers support their points with direct evidence and details. A series of free-response questions from the 2011 AP® English Language and Composition exam require the use of details to obtain a good score. The first prompt...

"The Wife of Bath's Tale" and "The Pardoner, His Prologue, and His Tale" from Chaucer's Canterbury Tales take center stage in a lesson that asks scholars to update the tales, craft a script, and either video their version or act it out...

Here is an app version of a powerful tool that allows you and your students to have one place where you can capture, organize, and share items in multiple media formats.  The different uses for this app are as varied as your ideas...

Learn more about Honest Abe with an informative passage that details his life chronologically. As learners read sections of the text, they answer multiple choice questions that draw on their ability to recall details from the passage.