Universal themes found throughout the world in the form of stories is the topic of today's lesson. Upper graders analyze the cultural context of the Mithila piece, Hanuman. They consider the universal themes the image depicts and how the...

Why didn't Rapunzel's hair stop growing?  Why did it take the fairy godmother so long to intervene in Cinderella's affairs? Young writers consider unanswered questions like these and compose news articles investigating the true...

Explore point of view and more with a Common Core-designed instructional activity. Learners experience different points of view by representing one of two characters from Esperanza Rising during a partner discussion. They must use...

Imagine having to give up cell phones, computers, and TV? What would be lost? What gained? An examination of the Drokpa, a nomadic people who live in the grasslands of Tibet, provides class members an opportunity to consider how access...

An educational lesson focuses on the idea of conservation of matter through a demonstration of the water cycle, a discussion of digesting food, and the path of carbon and oxygen atoms as they change form. 

The courage of Las Mariposas, the Mirabal sisters, is the focus of a series of activities designed to accompany a reading of In the Time of the Butterflies that ask readers to consider what it means to be courageous. Beautifully crafted...

The power of a picture. During the events surrounding World War I, propaganda posters were widely distributed in American society to sway the emotions of its citizens. By analyzing World War I propaganda posters in the first installment...

Budding novelists work on character development by relating to the characters in their stories. They imagine their own hopes and dreams and recall those of characters from books they've read. Learners also consider struggles the...

The point of view in a story can dramatically change the story itself. Focus on finding the points of view in various reading passages with a language arts packet, which includes fiction and nonfiction text.

Focus on vocabulary, comprehension, and analysis while reading A Weave of Woods, a colorful picture book by Robert D. San Souci. Young learners use worksheets to preview, predict, practice paraphrasing, and make comparisons. The...

Kate Chopin's short story, "The Story of an Hour" and John H. Young's "Our Deportment, or the Manners, Conduct, and Dress of Refined Society" offer high school juniors an opportunity to compare the role of women in the 19th century with...

Who keeps animals safe? Who keeps us safe? Discover the helpers that make learning and growing possible through a medley of activities that focus on habitats—ours and those in the rainforest. Scholars are asked to identify one...

The United States of America was founded on firm ideals of both the pursuit of happiness and a spirit of reverence. Through a close reading of Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The May-Pole of Merry Mount," you can examine what some consider was a...

Soldier's lives are often a topic when studying the Civil War, but what about the lives of civilians? Scholars use the characters from the novel Bull Run to better understand the lives of those not directly on the Civil War battlefields....

Alliterative adjective nicknames generate stories inspired by Rosemary Wells' book Noisy Nora (also a thematic complement to any class with children who make a ruckus to get attention). Class members explore basic story elements --...

Examine the movement of characters in the story, Caps for Sale. Using the text, pupils invent gestures and movements for some of the actions and major events. They practice retelling a story by using the movements they developed. They...

Everyone loves the tales involving King Arthur and his knights. After reading Knights of the Round Table by Gwen Gross, learners draw inferences and conclusions, analyze story elements, and discuss figurative language, including...

Using a variety of multi-media resources, your high schoolers become familiar with the parts of plant and create a story about plants using vocabulary learned during their research of plants. Completed stories are published using the...

Prompt your class to interact with Jack London's Call of the Wild. By analyzing the events in the novel, middle schoolers discover how human experiences create who a person becomes. They critique and analyze the reading, focusing on...

Story chains connect literary concepts, reinforce context clues, and even help learners predict what's coming next! Using words from the next chapter of Sharon Creech's Walk Two Moons, middle schoolers craft story chains to...

Do your young authors suffer from writer's block when they try to write short stories? Access their natural creativity with C-Gor, the writing monster! The instructional activity takes aspiring authors through a new writing process...

Cinderella is a classic love story when Cinderella is the protagonist—but what happens if a stepsister tells the story? Focus on point of view with a lesson plan about fairy tales and story elements. After reading a few familiar fairy...

Introduce your class to Edgar Allan Poe with a series of mostly self-guided tasks and assignments. Class members follow the list of tasks, starting by watching a video with background information and ending with a compare-and-contrast...

West Side Story is widely known as a modern-day Romeo & Juliet. Learners read a list of characters from the play and list their counterparts from Romeo & Juliet before completing a vocabulary enrichment activity and word...