Franklin the turtle is on another adventure in Paulette Bourgeois' book Franklin Goes to the Hospital, and there are plenty of new words for your young readers to explore as they hear this story. Although you can include more,...

Use the Caldecott Award-winning book Make Way for Ducklings by Robert McCloskey (which can be found on YouTube if you don't have it) to guide budding readers through vocabulary in context. Although the...

Barbara Joosse approaches an age-old question through an equally traditional culture in her story Mama, Do You Love Me?, which helps budding readers explore Native American vocabulary in context. Here you'll find...

The heartfelt true story of Owen the hippopotamus and Mzee the 133-year-old tortoise will have budding readers engaged as they practice vocabulary in the context of Isabella Hatkoff's nonfiction story. Although you could include more,...

Reinforce reading comprehension with a instructional activity about The Archer and the Sun, a Chinese folktale. Kids learn some background information about Chinese culture before reading the story, and answer literacy...

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, the fourth novel in the series by J.K. Rowling, is the focus of a directed reading instructional activity that begins by asking readers to examine the book cover and chapter titles and to predict what...

Identifying themes in literature is the focus of the language arts lesson plan presented here. Learners read short pieces of fiction and practice the skill of identifying the themes present in each one. The bulk of the lesson consists of...

Does learning to write leave your kindergartners in tears? Use these easy and memorable strategies to guide their pencils in the right direction. With cute illustrations and simple instructions, your learners will be writing paragraphs...

So much to teach, so little time. Keep track of phonics instruction with a guide that permits you to plan phonics lessons addressing 12 difference concepts, in four strands, in the handwriting, maintenance, instruction, and...

When is a preposition not a preposition? Learn about the role prepositions play in a slideshow presentation about phrasal verbs. As the class watches the presentation, they reinforce their skills with practice activities.

Whether it is a protagonist, antagonist, hero or heroine, characters are a must in any story. Learners analyze a character from a narrative they are reading, then use that character as inspiration. They create a ceramic bust depicting...

Second graders complete a variety of activities related to the book "The Clever Monkey" by Rob Cleveland. They answer story comprehension questions, and rewrite the story. Students also complete a comprehension and fact or opinion...

Fourth graders view a PowerPoint presentation "Setting goals." They use Kidspiration to organize long and short term goals for academics. Students write essays about Goal Setting. Students work in groups and create a dialogue involving...

Pupils complete a series of activities to discover life in ancient Egypt. They create want ads for pyramid workers, design vocabulary flash cards and dictionaries, and research famous Egyptians. They also research the "Curse of the...

Demonstrate strategies for tackling unfamiliar vocabulary words in preparation for the SAT. Using Visual Thesaurus computer software, middle and high schoolers interpret contextual clues, solve sample sentence completion questions, and...

Read and analyze a variety of Shakespearean and contemporary puns using Visual Thesaurus computer software. Middle and high schoolers analyze a pun as a class; in small groups they analyze a Shakespearean pun using contextual clues and...

Students discuss and write about different feelings they or someone else may have. In this feelings lesson plan, students discuss different ways they express their feelings. Then they get a picture with someone who is demonstrating a...

Middle schoolers identify independent and subordinate clauses and differentiate between the two. They discuss sentences, complete a practice worksheet, write independent clauses, and identify independent and subordinate clauses in the...

A talkative old man? A naïve believer in Human Perfectibility? A Sage? Who is this guy, anyway? The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin launches a study of the way Franklin uses structure, style, and purpose, as well as different...

Read the story Green Eggs and Ham to practice phonemic awareness, rhyming, and writing skills with emerging readers. They will match oral words to printed words, create a graphic organizer, and the use rhyming words in an...

Readers analyze an excerpt from Kate DiCamillo's novel Because of Winn-Dixie. They read silently, and then hear it read aloud. Definitions for underlined vocabulary words are in the margin, and other potentially difficult words...

What would a main idea be without important details? Readers use a graphic organizer to record key details from an informational text (a fiction text would also work). Review main idea as a concept before beginning, asking scholars...

What do you think will happen? Use a graphic organizer to help learners predict what will happen in a text. Consider modeling the chart using a familiar story, pretending you don't know what happens. Show scholars the book, explaining...

Anansi is a tricky character, but can he realize he's wrong and write an apology letter? Learners use Anansi and the Pot of Beans to practice writing, art, and figurative language. A series of activities are engaging for both...