First graders are introduced to the game of Word-O to increase their fluency while reading. Individually, they look, say and write at their high frequency words and practice spelling them. To end the lesson, they are introduced to new...

Bookend your study of Peter and the Starcatchers with a KWHL centered around treasure and power. Pupils work in small groups to compile knowledge and questions and then revisit this chart after reading and research.

Developed specifically for AVID students, this packet of materials that includes an explanation of the Socratic seminar, the preparation materials, and tips and protocols, is a must-have resource for any class. 

Imagine 28 instructional strategies, appropriate for all subject areas and all grade levels. Directed Reading-Thinking Activities (DRTA), Question-Answer Relationship (QAR) activities, KWL charts, comparison matrixes, classification...

A teacher's guide to Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness proves that it is not impossible to delve into the heart of darkness. Containing a wealth of information about Conrad, the Scramble for Africa, and the history of the Belgian Congo,...

Here's a must-have guide for instructors who use Robert Frost's poems in their classes. The 24-page guide focuses on poems included in Frost's first two volumes of poems, background information on the poet, and what Frost thought was an...

A unit covers many aspects of the Civil War. Over six weeks, fifth graders delve deep into the history of slavery, the Civil War—before, during, and after—Abraham Lincoln, women's contributions, the Emancipation Proclamation, and...

Reading about history is nothing like experiencing it firsthand. Encourage your eighth graders to do the next best thing with a historical narrative prompt, in which they describe the experience of a first-time traveler on the...

Begin your unit on Natalie Babbitt's Tuck Everlasting with a pre-reading activity about the novel's themes. As class members ponder five questions that reflect the book's themes, they talk about their opinions in...

Native peoples established civilizations all over Central and North America. Introduce native civilizations with a unit that promotes discussion, reinforces map skills, enhances reading comprehension, and exposes young historians to...

Find out just how smart your young mathematicians are with this cross-curricular math and language arts lesson. After first reading Shel Silverstein's poem "Smart", students draw pictures of coins to model the different exchanges...

Explore poetry, personification, and multiple languages with a poetry reading and writing lesson. After the teacher reads the poem to the class, a discussion about personification follows. The class then writes a collaborative poem...

Travel back to 1787 as young scholars investigate the creation of the US Constitution. After first working in small groups to create sets of classroom rules, students go on to read a summary of the Constitution and watch a short video...

Young historians trace the roots of African slavery and learn about the causes and effects of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade through a PowerPoint presentation and by reading and discussing excerpts from the book Copper Sun.

Help your class determine the types of pollutants coming from vehicle exhaust. Groups use an air quality monitor to determine the emissions from different vehicles, to gain knowledge about combustion energy, and to predict how the...

Groups suspend objects within layers of liquids to determine the densities of different liquids and compare them to the densities of objects calculated in Part 1. The groups then carefully test their calculations by layering the...

Prior to reading Viktor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning, class members use the provided worksheet to list what they know about the Holocaust, what they want to know, and how they will find the information they seek. After...

Scientists in California developed a bionic eye that allows blind people to see edges of objects in black and white and costs $145,000. In the activity, groups of scholars discuss bioengineering, focusing on the human eye. They then...

The lessons in the second unit in a three-unit series provide students with the historical background of disability education. After reading about events that impacted attitudes towards disabilities and how learners are identified for...

Though the movement for Women's Suffrage stretched over several decades and across two centuries, the final few years were the most difficult hurdle in many ways. Use a document-based question writing exercise to make inferences about...

Where can you see an aurora in North America? After completing an astronomy activity, scholars can locate the exact coordinates. Pupils plot points of the inner and outer ring of the auroral oval and answer questions based on...

Sixth graders discover how to turn book titles into questions in order to locate the information during their reading. Using t-charts, they list titles and subtitles with the questions they suggest. Gradually, 6th graders progress from...

In this ESL activity worksheet, students consider daily routines as they read a paragraph and find its text in the word maze.