ReadWriteThink
Let It Grow: An Inquiry-Based Organic Gardening Research Project
How does your garden grow? An inquiry-based, organic gardening unit asks young scientists to research a vegetable or flower, create an environment for it, and then plant and tend to the seedling. Gardeners develop their own research...
Curated OER
Organization Two: My Computer Folder
Students examine the ways in which computer folders and files help people organize and retrieve information. In this computer folder lesson, students are introduced to the computer as an important resource. Students discuss what a file...
Overcoming Obstacles
Getting Organized
If you've ever peeked inside a middle schooler's backpack, you know how valuable a lesson on organization can be. Help class members organize their binders, study habits, and schedules with a set of collaborative activities.
Student Handouts
Graphic Organizer: Reference Citations
Pupils practice researching sources and logging citation information with this graphic organizer. After posing a general topic, groups of students are asked to devise general questions about that topic, and to research sources that they...
EngageNY
Planning Writing: Bullfrog Information Paragraph
Lesson ten in this unit for the book Bullfrogs at Magnolia Circle, prepares third graders to begin writing an informational paragraph about the adaptations of bullfrogs. First, young writers work either independently or in pairs to...
EngageNY
Research Tasks: New Words, Relevant Information, Revision
Word builders. Scholars participate in a mini instructional activity about affixes. They then complete a research vocabulary organizer and share their definitions of the words with the class. They gather more evidence for their research...
Curated OER
Sorting and Using Materials
Students explore materials and their properties. In this matter lesson, students identify objects and describe their properties. Students test and sort materials using an interactive whiteboard, followed by a group discussion of what was...
Curated OER
Learning from the Past: A New Approach
Young scholars research nonprofit organizations. As they research, they learn how those living in the colonial period formed community organizations to provide for the common good of their society. Each pupil chooses one organization to...
Florida Center for Reading Research
Comprehension: Text Analysis, Compare and Contrast
Grab any two topics, some index cards, and a couple of kids, and you're ready to compare and contrast! The resource provides instructions for this method and three graphic organizers in addition to or in place of the index cards.
Newspaper Association of America
Community Connections with Geography and the Newspaper
Understanding geography and government begins at the local level. Using maps and the parts of a newspaper, a unit plan introduces the concept of community. It starts with the creation of classroom and school maps, and then moves through...
Ontario
Animation Programming—Computer Studies
Introduce high schoolers interested in animation programming to fundamental programming concepts so that they can plan and write simple programs.
Curated OER
Beach Comber
Students investigate threats to our oceans by investigating items found on a beach. In this environmental safety lesson, students examine several items found on a beach and identify them as natural, harmful, organic or inorganic...
EngageNY
Conducting Research: Analyzing a Variety of Sources to Capture Information about My Insect
From picture to words. Scholars analyze a picture of an ant and then list two facts they observed and any questions that may arise. Expert groups from the previous instructional activity then look at a diagram about either an ant or...
Social Media Toolbox
About Facebook
If everyone is on Facebook, should the school's news publication be as well? Scholars study a social media giant in the 11th lesson from The Social Media Toolbox's 16-part series. The activity combines individual study and collaboration...
EngageNY
Synthesizing Information: Writing an Apprentice Wanted Ad
Fourth graders view examples of help-wanted ads as they plan and create their own writing in the fourteenth instructional activity of this unit on colonial trade. The engagement of the class is captured when the teacher shares an actual...
Online Publications
Become a Journalist
Explore the newspaper as a unique entity with a detailed and extended unit. The unit requires learners to consider the newspaper's role in democracy, think about ethics, practice writing and interviewing, and examine advertising and news...
EngageNY
Summarizing and Synthesizing: Planning for Writing an Apprentice Wanted Ad
In instructional activity 13 of this unit on colonial trade, young researchers learn about apprentices as they prepare to write help-wanted ads for the specific trade they have been researching. To begin, the class listens closely as the...
Saskatchewan Elocution and Debate Association
Debate Games and Activities Guide
A must-have resource for classes that engage in debate, this packet contains 20 detailed plans for debate games and activities. Everything from how to select evidence to support a position, to structuring a debate on which candy bar is...
Middle School Computer Projects
Timeline of Your Life
Pupils can use PowerPoint as a tool to create clear timelines that show their lives in relationship to historical events. Take a trip to the computer lab and share this page with your class. Class members can watch each video and follow...
Curated OER
Capturing Watershed Experiences
Students observe organisms found in the water. In this lesson on organisms, students collect water from local streams and tributaries in order to study the organisms found in the water. As a culminating activity, students create a...
Santiago Canyon College
Taking Notes for Science Class
Provide young scholars with the tools they need to succeed with this reference on the Cornell note-taking strategy. By breaking the content of lessons into main ideas, supporting details, and overall summaries, students are able to...
Curated OER
BUS:PowerPoint: All About Me - Office 2003/2007
Teach the class how to put together a PowerPoint presentation using their autobiography as the content. First, have them use the outline given to put together their autobiography in storyboard fashion. Now, they have their content ready...
Social Media Toolbox
Twitter Time
Tweet all about it! Junior journalists explore the Twittersphere to determine its effectiveness as a news broadcasting tool in the 12th installment of the 16-part Social Media Toolbox. Participants follow and record their observations of...
Curated OER
How Communication Technologies Affect People
Third graders complete a worksheet, first with known information, and then with researched information. They create a PowerPoint, video, or radio broadcast to convey the results of their research. They learn to use a graphic organizer to...