Show your scholars that they make inferences every day and might not even know it. Through scaffolded instruction, they break down the process of drawing information from context. Using example sentences and didactic questioning,...

Visit the Magic Treehouse and take your class on a trip through time with a reading of the children's book Mummies in the Morning. Using the story to spark an investigation into Egyptian culture, this literature unit engages...

How does a society influence and shape individuals? Class members ponder this essential question as they read Lord of the Flies, as well as primary source materials about the historical background of the novel. As a...

Compare and contrast two pieces of literature with this lesson. With the use of a Venn diagram, pupils make connections between literature and real-life situations. They practice skills of surveying a text looking for important details,...

Here is an authentic assessment task for Shakespeare's Macbeth. Young literature scholars prepare, perform, and record a news broadcast about the major events in the play. For example, groups may choose to report on the death of Lady...

Connect literature (Jack the Builder) with mathematical concepts. In a series of computation, geometry and number sense activities, pupils count on to add, count back to subtract, build cylinders, cones, and rectangular prisms, and name...

Students explore world literature through completing several varied exercises. In this compare and contrast lesson students compare and contrast stories and how time and culture impacts the stories.

Distinguish between textual features of non-fiction in the book The Lewis and Clark Expedition and in the non-fiction story "Ta-Na-e-Ka." Third graders create posters and participate in group discussions to show their...

Is your Kindergarten class about to read the book, Chicka-Chicka-Boom-Boom? If they are, and you want a few wonderful activity ideas to reinforce phonemic awareness and letter identification skills, look no further. Here you'll find over...

Analyze the central idea or literary theme found in a series of quotes from the Shakespearean play, Hamlet. For literary analysis, learners paraphrase excerpts from the play and then identify the characters' motivations for their speech.

Make reading more enjoyable and interactive with literature circles! Here you'll find detailed lessons to begin the literature circle process. Ten lessons introduce each role learners take on. Literature circle roles include...

“An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” Ambrose Bierce’s short story, is used to model how structural moves, the decisions an author makes about setting, point of view, time order, etc., can be examined to reveal an author’s purpose. Groups...

The memoir, Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson, is the focus of a unit designed for fourth graders. Scholars begin each lesson with a warm-up, then listen to a read-aloud of a section of the book. Pupils complete word work,...

This is a fantastic collection of a wide variety of rubrics for writing, listening, and speaking! The resource contains over 14 rubrics for assessing such items as a summary, autobiographical sketch and narrative, speech, oral...

See it through my eyes. Scholars complete mid-unit assessment part II by writing an essay describing how the narrator's point of view influences how the story is told in the text In the Middle of the Storm. Pupils also complete a...

As part of their study of Things Fall Apart, class groups develop a multimedia presentation in response to the question, "In what ways does Achebe use literature as a means to express and comment on culture and history?"

To launch a unit study of the concept of diversity in World Literature, class members compare Chinua Achebe's essay, "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness" and Richard Rodriguez's essay, "The Chinese in All of...

Increased reading comprehension begins with decoding and automatically recognizing words, which is the focus of this instruction. Using their choice of six different Winnie the Pooh stories, partners practice a variety of strategies...

Identify the main idea and the supporting details of a story in a literacy resource from Discovery Education. Complete with procedures, vocabulary, and assessment activities, this is a great way for pupils to practice their outlining...

Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises revisits his time in Spain. After completing the novel with your class, consider adding some of these study questions or essay topics to your learners' final assessment. There are three study...

Figures of speech, sensory details, and academic language are all targeted while reading Chapter Two of J. Ferris’ Go Free or Die. First, learners engage in an exercise to practice describing with detail. Then, partners use a...

Students prepare for and respond to literature selections. This package includes eleven lessons from the American Literature, The Earliest Days: Prehistory to 1750 each covering a different reading selection. Pre-reading and response...

Learners prepare for and respond to literature selections. This package includes nineteen lessons, each covering a different reading selection. Pre-reading and response activities are included for each lesson as well as extension and...

Students prepare for and respond to literature selections. This package includes twelve lessons from the American Literature, Regionalism and Realism: 1865-1910 series, each covering a different reading selection. Pre-reading and...