American women have been working toward equal rights since the ink dried on the Declaration of Independence. Focused on the words and actions of Sojourner Truth, Shirley Chisholm, and Venus Williams, a language arts lesson takes eighth...

Should a criminal's punishment match the crime? An argumentative writing plan explores this question as class members investigate a variety of mixed-medium sources by experts in the field, form evidence-based claims, and support them...

For classes tackling To Kill a Mockingbird, this lesson plan sets readers up for discussions or essay writing with questions and prompts. The prompts encourage individuals to explore beyond the novel itself, looking at...

[Free Registration/Login Required] This paired text focuses on the theme of Discovery; it includes two reading passages, "Jack's Lost Kite" and "The Treasure Map," comprehension questions for each passage, and a combined set of questions...

Teaching a book unit this year? It's a best practice to supplement book units with short passages from a variety of different genres. These 92 reading passages were handpicked by master teachers to supplement your book units. They...

Selected (12) reading passages (grades 7-11) to pair with "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee. A young Scout watches her father, prominent lawyer Atticus Finch, defend Tom Robinson, a black man accused of raping a white woman in the...

Selected (10) reading passages (grades 8-12) to pair with "Wide Sargasso Sea" by Jean Rhys. Written as a prequel to Jane Eyre, "Wide Sargasso Sea" follows the life of Antoinette Cosway from her tumultuous childhood in Jamaica following...

Selected (11) reading passages (grades 8-11) to pair with "The Poisonwood Bible" by Barbara Kingsolver. This story follows the wife and four daughters of a Baptist preacher who moves them to the Belgian Congo in 1959, setting the...

Selected (8) reading passages (grades 5-10) to pair with "Wonder" by R. J. Palacio. Wonder is the story of Auggie, a 10-year-old boy who has Treacher Collins Syndrome, a condition that causes numerous physical deformities and...

Selected (7) reading passages (grades 6-8) to pair with the nonfiction book "When I Was a Puerto Rican" by Esmeralda Santiago. Esmeralda Santiago, also known as Negi, describes her childhood growing up in Puerto Rico and her eventual...

Selected (12) reading passages (grades 6-11) to pair with "Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe. In this classic novel, Okonkwo, a wealthy and respected member of the Umuofia clan, resists the forces of change brought to Africa by...

Selected (8) reading passages (grades 8-12) to pair with "The Sun Also Rises" by Ernest Hemingway. In the years following World War I, a group of disillusioned expatriates travel from Paris to Spain to watch bullfighting and participate...

Selected (8) reading passages (grades 6-10) to pair with "World Without Fish" by Mark Kurlansky. Mark Kurlansky discusses how humans treat the oceans and the fish that live in them, and what the world will likely look like if fish...

Selected (4) reading passages (grades 7-11) to pair with "The Wave" by Todd Strasser. A high school teacher conducts a social experiment to teach his students about the atrocities of the Holocaust. However, the wave starts to spin out of...

Selected (6) reading passages (grades 7-10) to pair with the drama "A Midsummer Night's Dream" by William Shakespeare. The overlapping story of several couples and the inevitably complicated road to love encompasses a play within a play,...

Selected (6) reading passages (grades 8-12) to pair with "A Streetcar Named Desire" by Tennessee Williams. After losing her family estate to creditors, Blanche DuBois moves in with her younger sister, Stella, and her working class...

Selected (9) reading passages (grades 10-12) to pair with "The Scarlet Letter" by Nathaniel Hawthorne. After being forced to wear a scarlet "A" and live on the outskirts of the colonial Puritan settlement, Hester Prynne struggles to...

Selected (8) reading passages (grades 5-8) to pair with "Sahara Special" by Esme Raji Codell. Sahara Special is the story of Sahara Jones's 5th grade school year and the struggles she overcomes to make friends and reach her potential as...

Selected (8) reading passages (grades 6-10) to pair with "Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry" by Mildred D. Taylor. Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry tells the story of the Logan family combating racial tension and segregation in Mississippi during...

Selected (9) reading passages (grades 9-11) to pair with "The Remains of the Day" by Kazuo Ishiguro. After decades of striving to be the perfect butler, Stevens embarks on a drive through postwar England that prompts him to reflect on...

Selected (8) reading passages (grades 9-11) to pair with "Pride and Prejudice" by Jane Austen. Elizabeth Bennet clashes with the proud Mr. Darcy, but soon questions her rush to judgement - in this classic commentary on love, propriety,...

Selected (7) reading passages (grades 7-9) to pair with the autobiography "Persepolis" by Marjane Satrapi. "Persepolis" is an autobiographical graphic novel depicting Marjane Satrapi's experience during the Islamic revolution of 1979....

Selected (7) reading passages (grades 10-12) to pair with the drama "Othello" by William Shakespeare. Othello, a revered general of the Venetian army, has his newlywed wife meet him in Cyprus where he's stationed. But while there his...

Selected (9) reading passages (grades 7-11) to pair with the coming-of-age novel "The Outsiders" by S. E. Hinton. Ponyboy Curtis, a member of the Greaser gang, learns the value of family and friendship through his conflict with a rival...