Students determine that environments have living and nonliving parts. They discuss what makes something a living thing and something a nonliving thing. They make a chart and list characteristics of living things and nonliving things.

Explore emotions associated with moving to a new home with young learners. First they listen to the books Painted Words/Spoken Memories by Aliki and Going Home by Eve Bunting. Then they are invited to share their experiences as well as...

Kindergarten through second graders explore the long i sound. In this phonics lesson, they read The Mother's Day Mice, sing "Farmer in the Dell," and play I Spy with long i in order to explore the target sound. Additionally, there is a...

Enrich a unit on The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros with a selection of related activities. The packet contains nine activities that go from pre-reading through wrapping up the novel. Young readers work on studying...

Here is an excellent lesson for young learners who are just beginning to explore the concept of using units to measure length. They rotate through four classroom centers in order to gain practice in utilizing this important skill.

Who is Isadore Duncan? If you're a teacher of dance, you might be interested in this informative presentation. Biographical, philosophical, and personal information on the life and contributions of this famed dancer are given in an easy...

Here is a wonderful online language arts activity for your emerging readers. Learners play an interactive game where they look at two characters who are engaging with each other. They must choose the word from a word bank that best...

Students engage in producing responses to "what" questions and their written responses will be recorded in a Travel Journal. They produce their respones using a word processor. This lesson is very detailed and a rubic is included.

Germination is an amazing process that results in amazing things. The book The Tiny Seed is the inspiration for a set of activities that will help build early literacy, observation, language, and writing skills. The class observes how...

Today's kids are probably not familiar with the conventions of letter writing, due to the boom of technology. Here is a lesson that will provide opportunities for formal and informal letter writing. 

Using a variety of activities, kindergartners explore sorting and classification. Learners engage in an online sorting activity, read books involving classification, and create their own class book. This is a marvelousway to explore this...

The students listen to a book about being different and investigate that everyone is different, but special in their own unique way. The students draw a picture of themselves using multi-cultural markers. Along with the drawing, the...

Introduce your middle schoolers to a performance and movement activity that uses their favorite stories from fairytales and folklore. They practice basic acting skills, create dialogues with a partner, and then as guided practice,...

Your shoes get a lot of mileage in familiar places. Represent the places you have traveled the most with an art project based on a print of Indian People Wear Shoes and Socks by Juane Quick-to-See Smith. Kids trace their shoes and...

How are short stories from South Africa connected to issues of civil rights in the United States? A unit plan uses South African short stories to discuss issues such as apartheid, colonization, and civil rights. Questions and activities...

Students investigate early African civilizations. They create Kufi hats, musical instruments, pottery and African masks, sing songs, play African studenT games, and participate in a feast and tour of a museum where their artwork is...

Learners read Spelldown, by Becky Mushko and consider how it portrays the Appalachian community. They define and discuss vocabulary presented in the story and write a comparison/contrast paper analyzing two of the story's characters. The...

First graders compare their environment with that of Belize by researching via the internet on the sites provided. Students participate in various activities/centers utilizing the information they discovered.

Stereotyping and discrimination are explored in this social justice lesson.  Students listen to the book Dragon of Brog, in which mythical characters experience discrimination. Then, they sculpt a magical character out of plasticene...

Should primary graders have their own computers? Should animals be kept in captivity? Young writers learn how to develop and support a claim in this short unit on persuasive writing.

Support your instruction of The Cay by Theodore Taylor with this extensive unit of materials. Provided here are prereading activities, worksheets and discussion questions for the entire book, and reading quizzes that you can use to check...

Here you'll find a great collection of worksheets to supplement your instruction of Greek mythology, including informational texts on the Olympian gods and goddesses, a matching quiz, graphic organizers, and myth-writing activities.