An outstanding presentation clarifies one of the most misunderstood and misused punctuation marks: the colon. With clear instructions about the appropriate times to use the colon and examples of proper usage,...

Fifth graders will enhance their typing skills and practice using Pages, a software for Mac computers, by writing their own children's book. Note: This lesson plan refers to a template that is not included, however, you can adapt this...

How would you spend your last days with a loved one? The movie guide for The Fault in Our Stars prompts scholars to compare important scenes from the novel to the film and contains background information about the author, guided...

Be curious! Seek out different opinions! Be conscious of your thinking process! After reading an article about confirmation bias and motivated reasoning, class members apply these strategies to the topic of school start times. They read...

Students write a persuasive essay about the death penalty. Students respond to students at St. Ignatius Catholic High School in Cleveland protesting the death of Adremy Dennis. Students research both sides of the debate, before writing...

Students examine a website for viewpoints on fitness as a legal issue. They form positions on communal responsibility vs. personal freedoms and present to the class their positions.

Here's a fun, creative approach to the profoundly important issue of human rights. Young citizens do three activities, two of which involve them finding images from magazines that reflect human rights of their...

After investigating different policies within the school district, young reformers select a policy they would like to change. They then investigate the policy, and craft a letter in which they advocate a change to the policy. For guided...

What is an advocate? Help high schoolers understand the issues forcing refugees to leave their home country. After gaining some information on the subject, high schoolers create a dynamic presentation and persuasive essay encouraging...

How can you spot a credible source? What even makes a resource reliable in the first place? Answer some of these questions with this presentation. Although intended for higher education, this PowerPoint could be modified for middle...

Are you teaching a high school language arts class and stumped for writing topics? Five pages of writing prompts for all kinds of writing should help you out. Many of these prompts refer to texts that are not included in this resource,...

The perfect resource for a beginning journalism teacher or someone designing a journalism unit, this activity prompts students to write a newspaper article. It covers all aspects of the writing process, such as a guided warm-up...

Students identify controversial topics on which they have strong opinions and model their own persuasive opinion pieces after the featured article. They compose persuasive essays on controversial issues that "hit home" for them.

Here's a resource that provides debaters with the background information and worksheets they will need when planning a policy debate. Templates and sentence frames, as well as a rationale for using debates in the classroom, are...

High schoolers explore sexism. In this character education lesson plan, students define sexism and discuss individual behaviors and institutional policies that promote sexism. High schoolers determine how they can be advocates to end...

Students examine the contributions of women on the international, national, and local platforms. In this writing skills lesson, students analyze a quote from Eleanor Roosevelt and compose essays that reveal how women advocate...

Students will locate designated URL's to learn more about cancer protective foods. They will inventory their own dietary habits and that of their family to see which of these foods they have eaten and which are regular parts of their diet.

Students investigate how to become advocates in an authentic environmental issue, in this case the invasion of the zebra mussel invasion of the Great Lakes. They complete graphic organizers during Internet research, while reading...

Here’s a great teacher resource - thirty-five writing prompts designed for high school writers. Categories include cause and effect, definition, expository/informative, persuasive, how to, descriptive, narrative, biographical narrative,...

For this online interactive literature worksheet, students respond to 10 short answer and essay questions about D.H. Lawrence's Lady Chatterly's Lover. Students may check some of their answers online.