Use short stories to teach English? Yes! Designed as a professional development opportunity for English language teachers, the ideas in this booklet can easily be adapted to advanced ESL/ELL classes.

As the saying goes, art often imitates life ... and literature! A series of activities designed to accompany a visit to the Ogden Museum of Southern Art encourage writers to find inspiration in various landscapes. The lesson includes a...

Prepare class members for the SAT Writing and Language exam with a practice test that prepares students for the types of questions and the kind of language used in the exam. Test takers must select the best way to fix poorly...

Provide young readers with the extra support they need using this series of 10 literacy lessons. Following a repeated sequence of learning activities, these lessons engage children in expanding their vocabulary...

Pitch your best news story to your news team, or the peers in your journalism class, with a instructional activity about finding, reporting, and presenting a story. After watching clips of different examples, as well as...

Learning how to read is a big challenge for young learners, but this series of lessons provides them with the extra support they need to succeed. With each lesson following the a clearly outlined format, children are introduced...

Unfortunately, not all students learn to read at the same pace, but with the help of this resource, you can ensure that they all receive the support they need to reach this important goal. Comprised of short...

Help your youngsters find meaning in the text they read with this series of five intervention lessons. Offering explicit, step-by-step instructions for walking children through shared readings of leveled books, these...

Does identity come from within, or do external forces shape it? Explore the complex identity concept with a two-unit module for 12th-grade language arts. The first unit uses A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams and "A Daily Joy...

What are the effects of competition in an academic environment? The competition between the main characters in A Separate Peace motivates a series of activities that asks readers to take a stance on competition, and then to develop a...

As class members continue their study of approaches to literary criticism, readers examine the symbolism and archetypal patterns in John Knowles' A Separate Peace, and how these parallels are used to develop a theme...

"First Appearance," Mark Twain's tale about overcoming stage fright, serves as a model of a personal narrative and gets young writers thinking about milestones in their own lives. After examining student models and considering the...

Students write dialogue. For this character development lesson plan students use direct or indirect speech to include a confrontation between two characters in their story. Students portray the emotions of the characters in addition to...

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs provides the lens class members use to analyze and evaluate the motivations of the characters in Sylvia Plath's "Initiation" and scenes from Mean Girls. Readers then select a character from A...

Be positive! That's the take-away from a lesson about how a positive attitude influences actions and increases one's ability to succeed. To conclude the lesson, participants create a plan for how to respond positively to obstacles.

Being a good listener is key to building and maintaining positive relationships. Use this lesson as a way to help children connect with others by becoming active listeners and improving their listening skills.

Visual and print propaganda are featured in a lesson plan that asks readers of A Separate Peace to examine the techniques used in propaganda from World War I, World War II, presidential elections, and in the novel.

What is the best way to compare and contrast viewpoints on the same topic? A persuasive writing unit plan addresses targeted skills, vocabulary, instructional strategies, and suggested resources that would be perfect for developing writers.

Trading in Colonial America is the focus of a lesson plan that boosts reading skills. As a class, scholars examine the informational text for crucial details, use their newfound knowledge to share information with their peers, and write...

Engage your pupils in a seres of journalism activities. For this journalism lesson plan, learners practice with AP style, analyze an article, practice writing leads, work with organizing information, and take a stab at writing headlines....

Newspapers aren't only for reading—they're for learning skills, too! A journalism unit provides three lessons each for primary, intermediate, and secondary grades. Lessons include objectives, materials, vocabulary, and procedure, and...

Every good novel needs a solid beginning! Setting the stage can have your budding authors stumped, so use this lesson to get them thinking. After examining the plot rollercoaster image (included) they consider the four places...