It's important that writers leave their readers with a strong and satisfying conclusion. Help your young writers develop the skills to compose a concluding sentence with the steps outlined here. After class members have had a chance to...

Scholars reflect upon their reading strengths and challenges to create personal reading goals. Participants use goal-setting verbiage in an accordion-style graphic organizer, a first step in writing a letter that details their reading...

Read and repeat. Scholars repeat the strategies for digging deeper into text from lesson two. This time they focus on Middle Ages Excerpt 2. Learners write unfamiliar words in the word catcher and use details from the text to add to the...

Pupils take part in a close reading of the poem, If by Rudyard Kipling, in which they delve deep into its meaning and identify its rules to live by. As the grand discussion progresses, learners then relate the poem's rules with those...

Make the connections between area, tiling, and multiplication. A performance task and associated unit presents the concept of area and makes the connection to multiplication. Pupils work through three major sections of instruction that...

Substitution is still the method of choice to verify number sentences. The detailed lesson plan has young mathematicians determining conditions for when number sentences are true or false through substitution. They learn to express these...

The first lesson plan in a unit that uses Christopher Paul Curtis' award-winning depression-era novel, Bud, Not Buddy, as the anchor text establishes the routines that will be used throughout the unit.

Let's make some sense of those thoughts! Scholars continue thinking about the different perspectives on Pearl Harbor. They analyze quotes from War in the Pacific, Day of Infamy, and Fourteen-Part Message. Readers tape each quote to chart...

For employers and recruiters, the first step in their quest to find good candidates is the paper screening process. They look at a candidate's application and resume and push forward the files of those who meet their requirements. Thus...

Fourth graders create journals with explicit descriptions of objects found on the school yard.  In this descriptive writing lesson, 4th graders read some of Lewis and Clark's journal entries before they explore the school yard, then...

Learners research the adaptations of desert animals and build their research skills. In this the adaptations of desert animals lesson, learners describe major factors that desert animals have on their habitat. Learners explore...

Third graders answer text-dependent questions of the story Nasreen's Secret School both independently and then collaboratively through using the carousel of questions strategy. This plan is the seventh instructional activity in a...

This wonderful art lesson invites students to design and “mint” coins bearing their own symbols. A simple carving andcasting process using Blick Wonder-Cut®linoleum and modeling clay is described in the plan. Coins can be one or 2-sided,...

Such a great resource and perfect for learners in Kindergarten through third grade. The class will discuss cloud types and formation, and then they'll get outside and draw as they observe the clouds they see. They'll need to take note of...

Playing with balloons, water, oil, and bottles help put this instructional activity over the top! Participants use air-filled balloons in water tanks to experience gas compression. They also use oil-filled bottles to experiment with...

What a wonderful way to meld art and culture! Learners create art work in the Suminagashi style using this detailed lesson plan. This art form, which is Japanese in origin, employs ink to create beautiful results. This will be a hit with...

Wow! What a lesson plan! Six terrific activities are described in great detail, in this 31-page document! Learners will model and explain cloud formation, sketch and identify certain cloud types, calculate and compare incoming and...

Practice reading strategies using Elizabeti's Doll by Stephanie Stuve-Bodeen. Readers utilize decoding and comprehension strategies before, during, and after reading the story. A detailed list of text features, high frequency words,...

Fabulous! Your 5th graders should love this project. As an ongoing lesson throughout the year students use temperature probes to record outside temperature and then document their data using spreadsheets. They use their weather data and...

The Fantastic Voyage is becoming close to reality. The class reads an article on the use of nanotechnology in the medical field and participate in a discussion about what they read. The discussion method helps class members become more...

Using chapter 1 of Jerry Spinelli's Milkweed, middle schoolers write a personal memoir based on Spinelli's style and a Six Trait writing activity. The instructional activity suggests several ways to activate prior knowledge, including a...

How does propaganda influence our vote? Through grand conversation, scholars gain information about what is and how to identify the different ways propaganda is used in a presidential election. Using their new-found knowledge, citizens...

Scholars become part of the cycle of matter with a reader's theater that showcases producers, consumers, decomposers, and the sun. A diagram and discussion concludes the learning experience and enhances comprehension. 

Learning to recognize the importance of the features of information text (i.e., titles, subtitles, endnotes, sidebars, etc.) is the focus of a reading activity designed for middle schoolers. Learners examine how these text features...