What are the most prominent symbols of the United States? Learn about the bald eagle, the American flag, and the Statue of Liberty in a reading comprehension activity that includes a short passage and five reflective questions.

What is the connection between greed and mercantilism? Historians consider this question by analyzing a fairy-tale like story about King Midas from the nineteenth century. The background information and excerpt help pupils understand the...

The United States Civil War forced Northern and Southern societies, as well as the people who made up those societies, to reconstruct their vision of themselves and their identities. A series of video-based web lessons look at the great...

Everyone is familiar with the beginning of Hamlet's soliloquy, "To be or not to be..." While reading Hamlet, help your middle schoolers analyze the lines that follow, but how do you help them make personal connections to the text? Use...

Teach young children that with a little perseverance and the help of a good friend, anything is possible. This two-part lesson series based on the book Giraffe's Can't Dance starts with a shared reading about Gerald and...

Break down the parts of argumentative writing with a critical thinking activity. High schoolers read an article of your (or their choice), and use a graphic organizer to delineate the ways the author structures his or her arguments.

Students make thematic connections and organize their ideas using a Venn Diagram. In this Venn Diagram instructional activity, students compare 3 different stories from a novel and fill in a Venn Diagram. Students then discuss their...

"What my father had anticipated was now actually happening." The Chosen explores the complicated relationships between parents and their children. Readers make personal connections to Chiam Potok's story, set in Brooklyn's Hasidic...

Accompany The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis with this activity worksheet. Spark a discussion about the story's characters' decision making skills while making inferences and allow learners to connect personally by...

Help your class make sense of nutrition labels with the ninth lesson of this series. After explaining the different information provided on packaged food labels, perform an activity that demonstrates the amount of sugar in a single can...

The next time you read a magazine or watch the news, make note of how many graphs you see because they are everywhere! Here, scholars collect, enter, and graph data using computers. The graphs are then analyzed to aid in discussion of...

The Silk Road connected the European, Middle Eastern, and Asian worlds. It also helped create the modern trade world. An analysis activity makes the importance of this Chinese innovation clear by asking participants to evaluate trades...

First graders complete activities with the story The Great Big Enormous Turnip by Alexel Tolstoy. In this language arts instructional activity, student view the story as a Cloze passage and work with a partner to fill in the blanks....

First graders read nursery rhymes and celebrate Mother Goose. In this drawing conclusions and predicting lesson, 1st graders create new ending for the nursery rhymes. Students gather data and make a graph showing their favorite rhyme.

With Mount Everest as the motivator, your earth science class learns about topographic maps. Begin by showing a film clip from The Wildest Dream: Conquest of Everest, featuring fearsome virtual imagery of a path up world's tallest...

Designed to be used in conjunction with a reading of Ben Mikaelsen's Touching Spirit Bear, the worksheets and activities in this 32-page packet focus readers' attention on how to break the cycle of violence and develop more productive...

Fill your classroom with grand conversations about emotions and the healthy ways to express them. Your scholars will create a collage, play a feelings game, read stories, and reflect on their daily feelings.  

Cellular respiration and photosynthesis relate closely, but many don't realize how. Scholars drag and drop the reactants and products to the chemical reactions for both processes. Then they answer three multiple-choice questions.

Who killed Laius? How is Creon connected to Jocasta? Where does the Oracle dwell? Get the details of Sophocles' Oedipus Rex straight with a crossword puzzle activity.

Reginald Gibbons' poem "In cold spring air" provides learners with a chance to develop their noticing skills. As a warm-up, class members watch Paul McCartney's video singing "Blackbird" and note words and phrases that stand out. They...

Although the methods are all scientific, forensic science was started by police officers rather than scientists, who relied on observation and common sense. Young detectives use many tools to solve crimes around the school in a...