Students examine World War I poetry for historical context, poetic devices, and participate in a class discussion. They write an analysis of the poetry's form and its content.

High schoolers explain how the availability of natural resources has affected human settlement patterns. They recognize the interactions of human populations on environments and compare the growth of two ancient cities in relation to...

Students use metaphors in order to see commonly experienced objects, events, and people in new and more meaningful ways.

Middle Schoolers research Arkansas community festivals which are tied to the landscape. They create brochures that reflect the festival from a geographical and historical perspective and share them with the class. This ambitious and...

High schoolers analyze "To Build a Fire" by Jack London and "The Open boat" by Stephen Crane. They write an essay in which they compare and contrast the narrators and plots in each story.

Prompt your class with the following question: What was the status of American Indians in Massachusetts during Jackson's presidency? To answer this question, class members will read a series of primary source documents (attached),...

Is your class reading Pride and Prejudice? In order to link scenes to the themes in Austen's novel, pairs take on the confrontation between Lady Catherine and Elizabeth (Chapter XIV). After writing their own version of the...

“The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” is famous, in part, because it established a uniquely American form of humor. For this famous story, Mark Twain combines the tall-tale, the dialect story, and satire. Here is a resource...

Learners create questions to pose to adults working in Middle School. In groups, students create a video interviewing the Middle School staff. They edit the video and format present it as an introduction to Middle School for perspective...

How does word choice affect the reading of a text? Compare two headlines that were written about the same event. Is one biased? Discuss how word choice often reveals the author's feelings about a topic. Then look at different techniques...

What is liberty rhetoric? Examine how people have used it in four different time periods and situations. High schoolers investigate original source documents and compare them with the Declaration of Independence to decide how liberty...

There are not many more apt examples of ethics gone awry than William Golding's Lord of the Flies.. Ninth graders focus the ethics of decision making with the examples provided in the plot. They focus on the...

Investigate the significance of adjectives with a newspaper activity that addresses effective language. Readers probe teacher-provided articles in search of the mighty modifiers, and practice by replacing them with a different word, and...

Need topics that are sure to engage your debaters? This list of public policy questions includes such topics as school mascots, regulation of major league baseball, physician-assisted suicide, and violence in video games. A great...

Positive character traits in literature are explored in this character development and literacy lesson. Learners listen to Cinderella by Charles Perrault and Little Gold Star by Robert D. San Souci, followed by a discussion comparing the...

Students analyze people's choices from different points of view. They read different scenarios and explain how they would react personally in that situation. Then they analyze what they would do in another character's position and...

Students explore the concept of cross-cultural misunderstandings. In this communication lesson, students read a scenario involving communication misunderstandings and discuss cultural perspectives.

Literature circles let kids interact with each other and hear different perspectives. explore literature circles. Group your class into small reading groups, and then assign each class member a specific role to keep them focused. After...

High schoolers complete literature analysis activities for Beowulf. They read lines from the poem and complete character analysis activities. In addition, they write and share a boast modeled on the text and then create heroes and...

Explore the origin of political parties in the United States. Learners work in groups to read and analyze copies of the "Report on Manufactures" written by Alexander Hamilton. Then, they complete a worksheet comparing the Federalists to...

Through this exercise, high schoolers identify character traits present in Romeo and Juliet. They listen to an excerpt from "The Office of Christian Parents: Showing How Children Are to be Governed" and participate in a Socratic...

Everyone wants to be part of a royal family. Let your pupils experience the privilege of royalty by rewriting the story The Frog Prince from the point of view of the princess. While the story line remains the same, perspective is bound...

Help your middle-schoolers expand their writing skills with this lesson on episodic writing, which focuses on story details, idea development, and organization. After reading "The Eighth Picture: End of Summer" from Patricia Reilly...

Learners write a letter.  In this irrigation lesson plan, students review how humans and the environment can interact with each other, learn new vocabulary words having to do with Mesopotamia, learn about irrigation and view maps of...