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Teaching the Holocaust through Literature
Centered on the short story "The Tenth Man" by Polish Holocaust survivor Ida Fink, here is a solid one-day resource to support study of World War II or Nazi history, short stories, or to complement any ELA unit on The Diary of Anne Frank...
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Letters From Rifka
Small groups read assigned chapters from the book, Letters to Rifka, then work together to fill out comprehension worksheets associated with their chapters. This fine, 13-page instructional activity culminates with each group getting...
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Forced to Flee: Famine and Plague
Students examine events the lead people to emigrate. In this Irish Potato Famine lesson, students research primary and secondary sources regarding the Irish Potato Famine and collaborate to create a classroom mural depicting the famine...
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Discovering Angel Island: The Story Behind the Poems
Students watch a video, view websites, and discuss the Chinese Exclusion Act that took place on Angel Island. In this Chinese exclusion act lesson plan, students discuss the interrogations that went on and fill out worksheets bout the...
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America: The Story of Us; Episode 7: Cities
This handout provides a brief description of late 19th century, early 20th century immigration and industrialization followed by five short-answer questions. On the reverse is a poem by Emma Lazarus about the Statue of Liberty and two...
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Conflicts Between Cultures
Fourth graders examine the issue of discrimination against new immigrants to California. They develop a class word web, read and discuss text, create a poster, and write a picture poem.
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America, A Home for Every Culture
Students investigate the many cultures that are represented in America. For this American culture lesson, students look at the food, languages, music, and traditions that immigrants have contributed to the face of America. They complete...
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Molly's Pilgrim
Third graders explore the multi-ethnic nature of America's citizens and examine the symbolism of the Statue of Liberty. In this Molly's Pilgrim lesson, 3rd graders discuss the poem "The New Colossus," examine vocabulary words in the...
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Pizza for Everyone
Pizza is the inspiration for the cross-curricular lesson plan detailed here. Start out with a poem about pizza and move into a discussion about balanced eating. To close the language arts portion of the lesson plan, ask your pupils to...
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Calling Names
Students explore how language shapes debate by researching the names and tags both advocates and opponents use when discussing a topical issue. For homework, they create name collages and write prose poems.
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Meet Samantha
In this Meet Samantha Word worksheet, students solve a word scramble, a word search, answer 51 reading comprehension questions, complete a crossword puzzle, write their opinion about an event from the book, write an acrostic poem,...
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Am I Really Free?
Fourth graders write about slavery and freedom. For this freed slaves lesson, 4th graders read historical information about free blacks during slavery and explore books, objects and slave narratives to learn more. Students write a...
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Angel Island
Eleventh graders understand that the experience of Chinese immigrants is exemplified as one of many other immigrants' experience coming to the United States.
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Wartime and the Bill of Rights: The Korematsu Case (Lesson 2)
Twelfth graders review how the government and Bill of Rights came into effect. Using primary source documents, they discuss if Japanese rights were violated when they were placed in internment camps after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. ...
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Pieces of the World
Students locate Australia in relation to rest of world, read poem Pieces of the World by Mervyn James, explore kinds of journeys that Australians have made, and examine their effects - the emotions, the realities and the practicalities.
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Lady Liberty: The New Colossus
Students research the history of the Statue of Liberty and the symbols associated with it. They read and discuss Emma Lazarus' poem and why it should persuade people to donate money to bring the statue to America. Students role-play as...
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The Truth Shall Set Them Free?
Students consider the notion and purpose of truth commissions, They work in groups to predict the commission's effectiveness in its efforts to promote peace and reconciliation among Liberians. Finally, students create found poems that...
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Becoming American: Between Two Worlds
Learners examine American identity. In this immigration lesson, students explore the plight of Chinese Americans in their attempts to assimilate into the American culture while keeping their Chinese identities.
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Appreciating Our American Heritage
Learners learn about the Chinese culture via literature. They read the poetry of Cathy Song, considering national pride as Americans and Chinese.
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Literacy: The Puerto Rican Papers
Young scholars in an ESL classroom are introduced to new vocabulary before reading a story in their native language. In groups, they discuss how the tradition of writing stories down became a tradition and answer comprehension...
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CSAP Preparation: "Strike While the Iron is Hot"
Students survey several concepts in literature, science, history, and geography as a preparation for the CSAP standardized testing experience. This nine lesson unit provides exposure to the format and content of the test.
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Ideas and Commodities Cross Cultural Regions
Students compare and contrast how commodities native to certain countries have impacted the economies of other nations. After gathering information regarding how commodities are grown and traded, students use their information to...
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Modernism: American Literature 1914-1945
What characterizes modern literature? The first few slides of this 31-slide PowerPoint discuss what sparked the change to Modernism and discuss some of the key figures of the time (like Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud). The 20s and 30s are...
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The Statue of Liberty: Bringing the 'New Colossus' to America
Students discuss meaning of symbols associated with Statue of Liberty, read and analyze Emma Lazarus' sonnet, "The New Colossus," and write persuasive letter to a nineteenth-century audience to gain support for bringing statue to America.