To practice pre-writing techniques your class will re-read the book George vs. George and complete a T-chart along with brainstorming ideas on how to organize their essay.

Fill-out a story map to help your scholars with pre-writing. They will use a story map template to pre-write. They also organize their ideas into steps which become the foundation for their first draft. Concrete objects are brought in to...

Youngsters write and construct their own autobiographies based on The Hundred Penny Box by Sharon Bell Mathis. They engage in pre-writing steps, narrative writing, and peer editing. This is the second part of a two-part project lesson.

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...

Responding to a question on the Machiavellian principle of a ruler's need for power and ruthlessness, young historians are given writing tips and a framework for constructing a well-developed essay in 25 minutes. The given structure of...

Introducing your class to essay writing? The gentle tone, concise explanations, and clear examples provided by a 17-slide presentation introduces young writers to the expository essay format. All that's missing is a complete essay with...

Students write their own fables. In this writing fables lesson plan, students use handheld computers to write a fable. The class designs a spreadsheet to organize common elements of fables. Students also edit each others' work.

Famous quotations by American Presidents are the focus of this Six Trait writing activity, which could be used in a U.S. History class or in language arts. After reading the picture book Theodore by Frank Keating, have your 7th graders...

Poems carved into the wooden walls of the Asian immigrant prisons on Angel Island provide upper elementary graders an opportunity to study not only the story behind the poems but to also focus on the figurative language employed by the...

Follow the format of Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles with a journal-writing activity. Readers choose a character and examine the character's life and circumstances through brainstorming, research, and discussion before...

If you are interested in having a basic framework for teaching expository, narrative, persuasive, and descriptive writing, this resource may help; however, you will have to find information on the different forms of writing to share with...

Young writers complete a unit of activities to learn and use writing strategies. They will complete 8 activities to prewrite, use descriptive words, asking and telling sentences, and correct spelling within their writing. Then they watch...

Eleventh graders, in groups, pre-write, draft, edit and revise a murder mystery short story to hone their skills in short story drafting, editing and revision, group collaboration and computer usage. They also evaluate writing for both...

Students read Arthur's Pet Business and  complete a pre-writing worksheet for expository writing.  In this paragraph writing lesson plan, students gather and organize material for a paragraph about pets.

After a class discussion on strategies pupils can use to pre-write, learners are given a topic which they use to guide them in selecting a book to read. Everyone uses a worksheet, embedded in the plan, to write down information from the...

Second graders review story mapping along with characters, setting, problem, events, and solution. They view pictures and tell the story of their picture orally then they write rough drafts and final copies of their stories in the...

Car For sale! In this GED prep lesson, writers develop a classified advertisement to sell a car. After a discussion of precise words and phrases, telling details, and sensory language, sellers draft their ad for review, revision and...

Whether preparing your second graders for an expository writing proficiency assessment or just planning on introducing the writing process, this 37-page packet is for you. The unit has everything you need from scripted lessons to...

How does one use a graphic organizer to plan writing? Introduce your writers to different types of graphic organizers by dividing the class into groups and assigning each group a particular organizer. Then, as they research chocolate...

Should people only have what they need? Questions from the 2005 AP® English Language and Composition Free-Response section asks scholars to write essays evaluating the argument that those who are more fortunate should give all excess...

Does your class love reading cartoons? Use their talents and interests to examine the process of writing a story they wish to tell through a cartoon. They develop the beginning, middle, and end of a story based on their original...

Fifth graders run a school newspaper on a school website and discover how to use various literary forms as they relate to the writing process. In this school newspaper lesson, 5th graders synthesize information from different sources,...

Young journalists try their hand at writing a news report. They go through the process of developing ideas, and collecting and organizing their information. The headline everyone works with is, "Mystery Disappearance of English Teacher:...