Students think about what makes a story interesting to read or hear. What kinds of details make a story come to life? How can a storyteller create a feeling of excitement or suspense? What kinds of characters do students like? If anyone...

Eighth graders successfully create a newspaper that reflects the Great Depression Era using texts and clues from the literary work Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck and Something Permanent by Cynthia Rylant and Walker Evans.

Students engage in a layered curriculum do some of the following: Analysis of Andy and Kaleku's lives. Include their lives, family, culture, traditions, and the parallelism in each other's lives.

Introduce your class to ekphrastic poetry with an exercise that asks them to examine Edward Hooper's painting House by the Railroad and Edward Hirsch's poem "Edward Hopper and the House By the Railroad." After a close reading...

Students choose a subject for a biographical research paper. They use books, the Internet, encyclopedias and articles to gather information on a determined subject then follow a rubric to write a research paper.

Students look carefully at two photographs by Dorothea Lange that relate to the universal theme of a journey. They identify parallels between Lange's photographs and two poems. They write about the theme of journey as it relates to their...

Students complete autobiographical writing assignments throughout the school year that they save and rewrite to put into a published book during the last month of class. They include photographs, drawings and mementos of their lives in...

In this literature worksheet, students respond to 12 short answer and essay questions about Emerson's Essays. Students may also link to an online interactive quiz on the novel at the bottom of the page.

Third graders discuss books that have been banned and the things that they have in common. They explore the concept of freedom of speech and write poems based on their discussion.

Students analyze the characters and conflicts in Shakespeare's 'A Midsummer Night's Dream. In this conflict resolution lesson, students read the play and track the character actions with the specific plots. Students then predict endings...

Young scholars complete a research project. In this mythology lesson, students identify the similarities between world mythology and The Lord of The Rings trilogy. Young scholars complete character plot diagrams for each episode of the...

Students compare and contrast the elements used in the 19th century British novel and those novels in American society today. In groups, they brainstorm what it might have been like to be a teenager growing up in England during the 19th...

Students explore the historic district via a scavenger hunt. In this community history lesson, students complete a scavenger hunt using historic postcards and clues as guides. Students create a timeline demonstrating changes of the area...

In this adjectives and adverbs worksheet, students learn the correct use of "bad" and "badly". Students correct the word usage in 10 sentences.

Finding and/or designing a menu of equally weighted synthesizing projects to end a unit can be a challenge. Simplify the task with this menu of individual and group projects meant to accompany a study of The Crucible. Presentations,...

What is love? Why is it important? Explore this concept with an interactive activity that brings together Bloom's taxonomy and Willa Cather's My Antonia. After completing the novel, pupils toss a Bloom's cube and then answer the...

Young scholars read the novel, The Time Machine, and compare H.G. Well's perceptions of the future with those presented in The Third Wave, by Alvin Toffler. They research current scientific and mathematical theories that relate to space...

Students explore biology by researching birds in class. In this raven identification lesson, students utilize the Internet to identify the anatomy, habits and habitat of ravens. Students write descriptive paragraphs about ravens and read...

Pupils are introduced to authors and discover they are real people. Using the author's stories, they are incouraged to write their own stories using technology. Using the internet, they research facts, ideas and stories and develop a...

In this equation of a line worksheet, 9th graders solve and complete 7 different problems. First, they find all values of the constant k, if the line contains the given points. Then, students write an equation of the line which passes...

Students find alternatives to conflicts that they, may confront in their everyday lives Through the use of literature, students are given opportunities to use parallel tasks that will instruct them on how to identify and correct their...

In this water safety learning exercise, students read paragraphs about water safety and write spelling words taken from each paragraph. Students write 5 words 4 times each.

In this paired conjunctions practice worksheet, students read an instructional page regarding correlative conjunctions and then respond to 13 questions.

Students compare and contrast the experience of the migrant worker as depicted in The Grapes of Wrath with the experiences of migrant children as depicted in the narratives and poems provided.