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Talk The Talk
Students create their own "talking sticks" that reflect personas they have invented in this Art lesson designed to introduce the Yoruba peoples from Nigeria. Emphasis is placed on personal reflection after completing the "sticks".
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Guided Reading with Jazz Baby
Jazz music and musicians are the focus of this language arts lesson. Young readers independently read the book Jazz Baby. To build fluency and independence they read silently, but are guided by directive comments from the teacher. They...
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Close Reading
Eleventh graders read and study Hamlet. Then they are introduced to close reading as a means of understanding what is being read--not only understanding the printed word, but also the nuances and connotations of language as it is used by...
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Comprehension: Identify the Main Idea from Text
Children in first grade listen and read along with the teacher to practice main idea identification. They use the provided reading passages to read, locate the main idea and supporting details. This is a fully scripted lesson which means...
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Evaluating Books
What are the characteristics of a good research source? At the beginning of a research project, have your class brainstorm evaluative criteria for primary and secondary source material. They then use the generated list to guide their...
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Tell Me; I’ll Listen
Encourage respect, responsibility, and caring within your classroom with a collection of lessons that spark dialogue and self reflection. To address character traits, lessons touch on topics such as staying safe in the cafeteria,...
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Applying SQ3R to Texts
After a review of the SQ3R strategy, readers use the provided prompts to respond to a text. The value of this worksheet is in the additional questions that move the learner into higher levels of reasoning.
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Your Own Greenhouse
Young science learners construct a greenhouse out of a plastic bottle. They use a nail to punch a hole through which a thermometer will be inserted to monitor the temperature. This simple experiment easily demonstrates the greenhouse...
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Cave Diagram
Students examine limestone cave geology and hydology. They study cave vocabulary.
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Rest in Peace, Maniac Magee
Scholars read Maniac Magee and create epitaphs for each of the major characters using precise words reflecting the individual characters personality and nature. They will learn what an epitaph is and practice writing their own. They can...
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Clash of Cultures: Comparing the 1920s and 1960s
Students compare the social, cltural and politicalp roblems of the 1920s with the 1960s.
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Shaping the View: Composition Basics
Students are introduced to the concept of composition in visual art. They examine various compositional structures and practice identifying the focus of various pieces of art.
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The Stranger Redeemed: A Portrait of a Black Poet
Read and analyze poems by African-American authors. Using the text, they identify the various patterns, subjects, language and dialects used. Then team up to compare and contrast the various authors and define new vocabulary. The lesson...
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Defining Success
The class defines what it means to be successful by examining the achievements of Rich Wilson. They create headlines for a mock paper, discuss achieving personal goals, and create a scrapbook of his journey. Tip: Use this resource when...
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The Lives of the People: To Understand the People is to Understand the Times
Students examine the time period of the Great Depression. Using primary source documents, they read excerpts of interviews done by author Studs Terkel for one of his books. They practice interviewing their partner in front of the class...
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What's in a Shape?
Students explore characteristics of shapes by making and using tangram sets. They discover how the tangram pieces are related to one another, and determine how many different combinations of the triangles, squares, and parallelograms in...
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A Brief History of Fairfax County
Students brainstorm a list of things they already know about the history of Fairfax County, Virginia. After reading a primary source document, they discuss the similarities and differences between their prior knowledge and what they...
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The Furry News: How to Make a Newspaper
Students investigate the process of making a newspaper using children's literature to create context for the lesson. The readers are asked to predict the events of the story as it is read to them. Then the teacher uses guided questions...
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Solving Systems of Equations
Students, using algebraic operations, solve and check linear equations. At the beginning of class, they write a paragraph comparing the solving of math problems to solving real life problems. Students observe solving systems of two...
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Learning About Phrases To Improve Fluency And Comprehension
Investigate the concept of phrases and how they are a crucial element for successful reading comprehension. High schoolers identify key phrases in reading selections. Afterward, they engage in writing exercises regarding what they have...
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Troublesome Word Pairs
This instructional activity helps to understand when to use commonly confused words. It includes definitions, writing exercises, and questions that require paraphrasing the meaning of sentences. A good exercise for middle schoolers, or...
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Lunar Learning
Students learn about the phases of the moon. In this moon phases lesson, students learn about what causes the moon to look different to us everyday and how the Earth and Sun's position determine what phase the moon is in.
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Stressed and Strained
Young scholars explore stress and strength in engineering design. In this engineering instructional activity, students become familiar with terminology associated with stress and strain on building material. They will have a class...