Young scholars explore "main idea." For this main idea and details reading comprehension lesson, students view a Brain POP video about main idea and then identify sentences displayed on the SMART Board that would be included in a...

What is a signal word? Recognizing these words is an important step in both reading and writing formal text. Review a list of signal words (provided and organized into specific categories), and then have your class play a game to...

Help readers recognize elements in a story. They will use pictures and text to gain meaning from written material. Have learners listen to the story A Plump and Perky Turkey and participate in a discussion. They recognize the...

A new baby means a lot of changes for Peter! Ezra Jack Keats presents this common childhood experience in his story Peter's Chair, the context of a detailed vocabulary study. Before you read, introduce the three new words scholars...

Connect poetry to a naturally kid-friendly topic: ghosts! Draw on your class's prior knowledge of the paranormal to help them access the classic poem "Haunted House" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. After a fun warm-up activity describing...

Second graders interact with the story of Alexander's horrible day by connecting it to their lives. They practice predicting, writing paragraphs, reading aloud, discussing his problems, making a card to cheer him up, and designing a pair...

A Taste of Honey offers learners a chance to practice with unknown words and context clues. Choose several vocabulary words to focus on as you read the picture book, or use the ones provided here. Pre-teach the words and have...

Poems by O. Henry, Marion Dane Bauer, Monty Roberts, and Langston Hughes provide the text for a study of symbolism, hyperbole, and imagery. Employing the “think-pair-share” strategy learners generate definitions of these terms and locate...

Are you preparing to teach Peter and the Starcatchers? If so, you'll want to take a look at this analysis of the text, which describes plot and literary elements in-depth and explores potential implications related to diversity and...

Students create movements that illustrate opposites.  In this opposites lesson, students discuss what opposites do for writing and relate to dance.  Students make movements based on their opposites.

Teach your English learners about theme through this found poem project. Class members read two versions of O. Henry's "The Gift of the Magi": the original version and a synopsis. After learning about themes and connecting theme to their...

Practice Internet research skills. Each class member will need Internet access in order to follow along as you model how to search using key words and to do their own research on African and Asian elephants. Their notes will go into a...

Clarify, connect, evaluate, predict, question. Laminate and display these colorful posers about the classroom to remind readers of the five basic strategies for comprehending all sorts of text. 

Using either online worksheets or print outs, 12th graders practice expository text comprehension skills by answering multiple choice questions, completing a vocabulary matching activity, and completing a crossword puzzle. This is...

Students are introduced to the topic of legends. Using the text of Irving's novels, they gather information on different cultures. They practice using new vocabulary and their listening skills. They retell the stories in chronlogical order.

Show a Powerpoint presentation about descriptive writing. Fourth graders brainstorm a list of writing topics and place them in graphic organizers. Then they write their own paragraphs describing topics of their choice and create...

Young scholars complete research to enhance their reading of "The Grapes of Wrath". Using the text, they identify and locate cultural artifacts and discuss their symbolic connotations. As a class, they create a museum exhibit of the...

Have your scholars read a handout related to the foreign trade market and how there is an exchange of goods. They read the information as a research assignment and make connections as to how the market fits together.

Tenth graders explore Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. After reading specific scenes, they brainstorm and discuss free will. Students observe a clip from the Dr. Phil television show entitled, "Afraid to Age" and make connections from the...

Set the stage for Nightjohn, Gary Paulsen's young adult novel about slavery set shortly before the Civil War, by asking readers to indicate whether they agree or disagree with several statements that are connected to issues...

Pull quotes from a text and craft responses to the quotes you chose. First, read a  short excerpt from Mary Claire Wilfert's oral history. Then, read the contemporary poem "Robert's Cove," pulling quotes and writing responses as...

With The Great Kapok Tree, by Lynne Cherry as the hook learners discuss the rainforest, the animals that live there, and conservation efforts. Then, students write a letter to the man in the story asking him not to cut down the Kapok...

Introduce some nonfiction reading into your classroom! This resource contains seven comprehension questions pertaining to an article from The New York Times website about the first middle schoolers to ever win the United States Chess...

Students pretend they are water droplets traveling through the water cycle. Using their text, they discover the steps in the cycle and the different paths water can take. They write a report about their journey through the water cycle...