The thematic read-aloud anthology introduces young readers to life on a farm. The thoughtfully detailed resource offers three weeks of skills practice designed to boost reading comprehension skills. Lessons follow a routine of...

Fifth graders explore early American civilizations in a four-week ELA unit. Every lesson offers an opportunity to read and discuss a selected passage followed by word work that covers vocabulary, grammar, and morphology. Learners write...

How is Louisiana connected to the Holocaust? After reading The Diary of Anne Frank, eighth graders complete a research report about a survivor of the Holocaust who currently resides in Louisiana. Though the idea is a good way to...

Help young learners visualize the concept of "a million." To convey concepts of numeration and literacy, they will listen to the book How Much is a Million? by David Schwartz. They should be able to make self-to-text connections....

As learners continue to examine a short story of their choice, they take some time to look at analysis completed by others on the same story. In the eleventh activity in a series of fourteen, pupils explore various sites for literary...

Students gain a strong foundation for reading, writing, and using nonfiction through this lesson. They gain an awareness and general understanding what text structures are. Students also identify and interpret what clues they can use...

Get your class going on one of the final assessments for a unit on short stories by introducing iMovie and its main features. In this tenth instructional activity in a series of fourteen, pupils take some time to explore iMovie before...

Are you a good egg? Learners begin a farm-to-table lesson by acting out verbs in groups to demonstrate the egg production process, and then research the steps using online resources. Several excellent videos are linked through the...

Learners explore comprehension strategies as they listen to Zoom Broom by Margie Palatini. As the story is read, teacher and pupils will stop occasionally to make text-to-text, text-to-self, or text-to-world connections. They also...

Connect historical text to primary sources. Researchers observe and discuss primary sources. Then, historians bring in their own personal artifacts and connect them back to their history.

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...

As an introduction to Sharon Creexh's Walk Two Moons, a volunteer dons a pair of boots and walks about the classroom.Observers then ponder the axiom, Don't judge a man until you've walked two moons in his...

What does it take to develop and publish a newsletter? Young academics create a newsletter with original artwork for their school or community. They explore social justice themes and spread messages of tolerance and inclusion. Scholars...

Around and around we go! Scholars work in groups to connect The Hero's Journey and The Lightning Thief with a Carousel of Quotes activity. They then independently reflect on the two texts and answer questions about how they...

Partners practice reading fluency by reciting sentence strips to each other with proper expression and intonation. Partner A chooses a strip at random and reads it silently, then aloud with expression. Partner B reads the same sentence...

Adolescents have the opportunity to consider how they feel about the possibilities presented by the current availability of genetic sequencing. After some instruction, they participate in a four-corners activity in which you read a...

Learners practice remaining on topic during a conversation using printouts of chains as visual models for their work. Chains are placed in sequence while students stay on a shared topic of conversation, and a broken chain is used as...

Pairs help each other with reading fluency using phrase flashcards! Learners take turns reading short phrases aloud. They have one minute to read as many correctly as possible while their partner sorts the cards into a yes or no pile. At...

Mail me a postcard. Individuals design a postcard to show what Meg Lowman from The Most Beautiful Roof in the World might have written to her friends at home. They then continue to work on writing a science journal entry.

What is a white elephant, and what does it have to do with Ernest Hemingway? Study "Hills Like White Elephants" in-depth by following the procedures outlined in this lesson, the fifth in a series of fourteen. Learners start the day with...

Tired of those blank stares after your class reads a particularly complex passage from a Shakespearean play? Help high schoolers untangle that prose with a literature circle activity. Ten different roles prompt class members to focus on...

William Shakespeare penned some of the richest and most fascinating works of literature—or did he? Middle schoolers read three brief informative passages and conduct additional research to evaluate the claim that Shakespeare did not...

Modern Jewish holidays have ancient roots with many connections to today. Using photographs of primary sources, such as fragments of a shofar, as well as texts, such as the Hebrew Tanakh, learners explore how Jewish holidays reflect...

How should pupils read short stories? Set them up for this unit with an introductory instructional activity that goes over the main characteristics of a short story and starts learners off reading their first short story of the unit. In...