A reading of Mark Twain’s The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County not only offers pupils an opportunity to practice their listening skills but also provides them with examples of dialectic speech. This is the gol’derndest lesson...

Poetry is all about sound and rhythm. The sound of the words, the rhythm of the lines, and the emotional atmosphere created by these elements and the literary devices poets use, compress whole stories into a few stanzas. The specialized...

Students measure irregularly shaped bones, once using a variety of measurement methods and tools, and then again using standard conventions and metric tape measures. They explore firsthand that standardizing data collection makes...

Students complete a variety of activities related to the book "Because of Winn-Dixie" by Kate DiCamillo. They create a scrapbook of the characters in the book, play a reading comprehension maze game, and participate in an online...

Traveling through space is an amazing experience, but it definitely takes a toll on the body. After reading an article and watching a brief video, learners perform an experiment that simulates the effects of zero gravity on the...

When astronauts get hungry in outer space, they can't just call and have a pizza delivered. In order to gain an appreciation for the challenges associated with space travel, young learners are given the task of selecting,...

The Cold War—with its roots in World War II—impacts the world today. Using an extensive curriculum, scholars consider its impact through primary sources, including speeches and propaganda, as well as other skills-enhancing activities. An...

The second activity of a pair about Paul Laurence Dunbar, this plan focuses in particular on his poem, "We Wear the Masks." After a short historical introduction, class members conduct a series or readings, marking up the text and...

Spring has sprung in your classroom! An entire month of activities relating to spring prompts learners to color, draw, write, and work on phonics. 

Young scholars explore events and causes that led to American Revolution and examine popular pro-Patriot renderings and texts of these issues created both at that time and in later years. Students then prepare and deliver oral...

Have you ever looked up at the moon and wondered why it looks different every night? Learn about the moon's orbit and the lunar cycle with a reading comprehension exercise. Using context clues, kids find the definitions of unfamiliar...

Students record scientific observations in a science journal.  In this season lesson, students make observations about each of the seasons and record in their journals.  Students record organisms response to seasonal changes...

Young scholars find out about the social changes that caused the collapse of important ancient civilizations in Central America, Mesopotamia, the southwestern United States, and western Africa.

Students review the units of the metric system, convert from the US system of units of measure to the metric system, and estimate measures before converting between the two systems of measurement.

Second graders distinguish between and use nonstandard and standard units of measurement, use appropriate tools and techniques to measure length and width, and record and interpret data using graphs.

Students use technology to visit websites where they play interactive games, gather information to complete activity sheets, and complete online projects. One lesson using 'Inch By Inch' by Leo Lionni, takes students to an interactive...

In this measurements learning exercise, students find their weight, height, width and depth of their bodies at home using equipment around their homes. They use the proper number of significant figures to record their answers and they...

Students discover the multicultural contributions to New Orleans gumbo through participation in cross curriculum activities. For this multicultural diversity and New Orleans history lesson, students shade regions of a map according to a...

Students create brochures about the humor of Mark Twain. In this literature-analysis lesson plan, students read "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County" and other short stories by Twain. Students write analytical paragraphs and...

Students analyze period political cartoons as they study the causes of the Panic of 1837. They use primary sources to evaluate President VanBuren's response to the panic and public opinion of the results of his policies. Then they...

Chart your way to an understanding of nanoscale. Using a Google map, learners estimate a radius around their location of 1,000 and 1,000,000 meters. Predicting what 1,000,000,000 meters would look like takes them off the charts!...

Hold measurements to a different metric. Class members convert the measurements of a dog's tumor to explain the size to its owner. Using cards, learners match metric measurements with their English equivalents. They then read articles to...

Life science learners construct lung-o-meters from gallon-sized milk jugs and then measure their lung capacities. For older students, have them graph the vital lung capacities of each person in the class. Cross-curricular pieces are...

Create the ultimate miniature golf course. The 93-page model curriculum unit from the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education contains nine lessons on understanding similarity in terms of both Euclidean geometry...