Curated OER
To Kill a Mockingbird: Theme
So many themes are expertly woven through Harper Lee's novel, To Kill a Mockingbird. On the first page, scholars will read five themes, selecting an incident and a quote to highlight that theme. On page two, they use chapters 29-31 to...
The New York Times
Inaugural Words: 1789 to the Present
One of the reasons presidential inaugural speeches are so inspiring is the way word choice reflects the historical context of the time. An interactive timeline invites learners to click on their president of choice and view the most...
Bantam Books
The Tempest: Linked Text Set (Pre-Reading)
Before you begin your unit on William Shakespeare's The Tempest, introduce the themes of the play with a lesson based on the biblical story of Joseph. Taking your high schoolers through selected text from Genesis 17-44, the lesson...
Curated OER
Comparing and Contrasting Yourself to a Character
First and second graders explore character as a story element. They listen to the first part of the story First Day Jitters by Julie Danneberg and observe the teacher modeling a compare and contrast characters activity. Learners listen...
Curated OER
Introduce Vocabulary: How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World (Priceman)
Ask budding readers, "How do you make an apple pie?" You may get many answers, but Marjorie Priceman takes the cake with her idea in How to Make an Apply Pie and See the World, an adventurous tale full of wonder and new vocabulary. Using...
EngageNY
Launching Readers Theater Groups: Identifying Passages from Esperanza Rising for Readers Theater that Connect to the UDHR
Teach young readers how to compare two texts and select passages that exemplify a specific theme with Lesson 6 from Unit 3. Begin by modeling how an expert reader selects examples from a text, performing a think aloud on how Article 2 of...
Florida Center for Reading Research
Fluency, Connected Text, Partner Reading
This lesson plan pairs high and low leveled readers together to make partner reading beneficial for both. Learners read a selected text as a team, when the lower leveled reader is stuck, his partner is there to help him out. And by...
Florida Center for Reading Research
Fluency: Connected Text, Repeated Timed Reading
There are many different ways to build accuracy and fluency when reading. This exercise employs repetition and timed drills to get the job done. Learners time each other as they read a passage, recording each other's time and accuracy.
EngageNY
End of Unit Assessment: Making Connections between Song Lyrics and Texts
For the end-of-unit assessment, scholars engage in small group Socratic seminars to connect the lyrics of two songs to texts they read and studied. They discuss how the songs "Ain't Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around" and "Lift Every Voice...
Newspaper Association of America
Community Connections with Geography and the Newspaper
Understanding geography and government begins at the local level. Using maps and the parts of a newspaper, a unit plan introduces the concept of community. It starts with the creation of classroom and school maps, and then moves through...
EngageNY
Connecting the Theme of the Expert Group Myth to a Theme in The Lightning Thief and to Life Lessons
Expert groups discuss the theme of their myths and the life lessons people learn from it. They then regroup their triads so that there is a pupil from each expert myth group and share details about their myths. The class also talks about...
EngageNY
Analyzing the Significance of the Novel’s Title: Connecting the Universal Refugee Experience to Inside Out and Back Again, Part 3
What does it mean to mourn something? Scholars continue reading paragraph four from "Refugee and Immigrant Children: A Comparison" to better understand the mourning process for refugee children. Working with a partner, pupils then read...
Utah Education Network (UEN)
8th Grade Poetry: A to Z Poem
A two-part activity asks eighth graders first to draw connections between the myth of Aengus and William Butler Yeats' poem "The Song of Wandering Aengus." In the second part of the activity, writers craft an "A to Z Poem."
Penguin Books
An Educator’s Guide to Chraisma by Jeanne Ryan
Often, science fiction makes a lot of connections to real life. An educator's guide for the novel Charisma by Jeanne Ryan, has readers discuss many of the real-life issues that come in the text. A brief summary helps garner interest in...
Curated OER
AWARD CERTIFICATE FOR A CHARACTER
Connect to real-world experiences by having your primary learners create an award certificate based upon literal and inferential information from a story. They present the award to a character from a story and explain the criteria used....
Florida Center for Reading Research
Fluency: Connected Text, Rereading Decodable Text
Using a familiar decodable text, pairs take turns reading sentences. The partner who isn't reading follows along silently, helping if needed. They alternate sentences until the entire book is finished and then reverse to read the other...
Curated OER
Learning From World War II and Connecting It to the Present
Compare and contrast World War II to the modern Iraq war with this instructional activity. After watching a film, learners use supporting evidence to support their point of view of the conflicts. Using the internet, they create a...
EngageNY
Mid-Unit Assessment: Text-Dependent Short-Answer Quiz—The Effects of Natural Disasters
Readers complete a mid-unit assessment by reading the text How Do Hurricanes Form? They answer text-dependent questions about hurricanes with short answer and sequencing. Learners then participate in a read aloud and text chunking...
EngageNY
Getting the Gist and Determining Word Meaning: Paragraphs 20–23 of Steve Jobs’ Commencement Address (and connecting to Chapter 10)
Groups create a list of the character traits of Steve Jobs and Buddy, the main character of Christopher Paul Curtis' Bud, Not Buddy, and share and select evidence from Jobs' 2005 Stanford University Commencement Address to support their...
Curated OER
Writing Prompts for High School
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,...
Curated OER
Newcomers
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...
EngageNY
Pairing Texts: Understanding Brown v. Board of Education’s Impact on Carlotta’s Journey
Scholars work in groups to compare Brown v. Board of Education excerpts and A Mighty Long Way. They use the Paired Text note catcher to organize their thoughts and divide the work using a jigsaw activity to track Carlotta's journey.
University of Delaware
Constructing Text-Based Arguments About Social Issues
Eighth graders take a stand on a variety of controversial topics with a lesson on argumentative writing. As they view an informative presentation and work with collaborative groups, they decide which side of each argument they want to...
Washington Township Public Schools
Using Paired Text
Paired reading passages frequently appear on standardized exams, but finding text sets to use in the classroom is sometimes a challenge. A lesson plan on using paired texts includes a selection of passages and a graphic organizer for...