Julie Otsuka's haunting novel, When the Emperor Was Devine, is the subject of a 14-page teacher's guide. The guide includes the text of an interview with Otsuka, background information about Japanese immigration to the United States, and...

Shirley Jackson's short story, "Charles," provides middle schoolers with an opportunity to practice their close reading skills. Using the provided list of prompts, scholars read and reread the story, then create a multimodal response to...

We carry memories of where we're from; tweens and teens can capture these memories by first listening to several memory poems and then crafting their own. They analyze literary devices other poets use, brainstorm a list of images they...

Willy Wonka takes center stage in a lesson plan about direct and indirect characterization. Scholars read a passage from the story about Wonka's Grand Entrance and watch a film clip of the same, noting examples of direct and indirect...

Middle schoolers get hip to the jive with a lesson about slang. They closely examine examples of slang and use context clues to infer the meaning of the terms. Groups read and summarize an article about a teacher who created a Gen Z...

The second lesson in the series asks groups to analyze an exchange of love letters between Abigail and John Adams. Scholars identify the many allusions and references in the letters and consider what they can infer about the writers.

How do scientists know they're right? Truth be told, they don't always know. Explore the scientific process using mystery tubes in an insightful activity. Young scientists discover how to approach and solve problems in science, how ideas...

Delve into Esperanza Rising by Pam Munoz Ryan with close reading and evidence-based, text-dependent questions. Part of a unit series, this well-sequenced, Common Core-designed activity draws on material from the previous day and homework...

Readers of "The Palace Thief" focus on how the author's descriptions and word choices reveal the characters of the narrator, Sedgewick, and the senator.

The fourth activity in a unit on crafting a research paper focuses on cohesion within and between paragraphs. Class members examine models that lack cohesion and ones that are cohesive and logically developed before using what they have...

Wiggle your way through lab day! Young zoologists observe and infer the effects of different stimuli on earthworms during an engaging lab from the K20 series. Lab partners set up four different controlled environments, then record how...

Scholars receive numbers as they work in groups to read Inside Out & Back Again. The instructor calls out specific numbers for readers to share the group's thoughts. Then, they use a model passage to demonstrate the effective actions...

Danger! Scholars look closely at two poems, 'TV News' and 'Closed Too Soon.' While reading, learners think about Ha's country's increasing dangers and conflict. They record their thoughts in graphic organizers and discuss what details...

Music has the power to bring topics alive. Learners take on the role of sound director in their film planning and choose the songs to accompany their photographs. They must also support their decisions with evidence and reasoning as they...

Scholars begin the instructional activity by watching a video of media history and discussing it in a Turn and Talk. They then look at the texts A Mighty Long Way and Little Rock Girl 1957 to make a connection to the role of the press in...

Learners take a gallery walk around the room to view images and text of Victorian England culture and then complete a Predictions Walk note-catcher as they circulate and take turns reading quotation strips from Pygmalion. Class...

That's an interesting perspective. Scholars read chapter five of World without Fish and use an Author’s Point of View graphic organizer to determine the author's perspective. In triads, they highlight words that support the author's...

Fourth graders examine the basic survival needs of birds before examining a suet ball as an example of what birds eat. They conduct an experiment with pine cones, bird seed, vaseline, and peanut butter. By observing the birds, they...

Students observe how to classify things into groups based on physical properties.  In this plastic and rubber lesson students group and sort items to help them to better identify properties. 

Students examine statistics and data analysis concepts from the practical questions that arise in everyday life.

Students make observations about Mystery Boxes that their teacher has made up and describes the motion of the object inside the box and hypothesizes it's shape based on their observations.

Students discover words through text, audio and images that begin with the letter B.  In this letter B lesson, students download an ebook and navigate through an interactive reading activity. 

Students examine a method biologists use to try to determine relationships. They examine how amino acid sequences have been determined for a number of proteins, and how scientists can make inferences about DNA based on the amino acid...

Students review healthy eating habits, and demonstrate reading comprehension skills, including reading strategies, inference, literal meaning, and critical analysis.