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Publication Project
Ninth graders publish a magazine during a ten week marking period. They make individual contributions to the group project that is based on career choices. They write and publish articles, poems, entertainment pieces, and a play that...
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Let Me Convince You
Students discuss the purposes of persuasive speaking and writing with emphasis upon what makes them different from other kinds. They brainstorm and discuss ways to select "The Greatest American Who Ever Lived" and prepare a persuasive...
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The Teacher Directs: The Experience of Movement in Literature
Experience movement in literature. High schoolers are introduced to new vocabulary related to drama and theatre. In groups, they use a piece of literature and develop their own skit to act out in front of the class. As a class, they are...
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: "Synthesizing Content on a Continuum" Activity: Developing Effective Communication
Young scholars express their opinions on the danger from HIV. They study appropriate speaking techniques and become aware what it feels like to learn that they have been infected with an incurable, fatal disease. The share personal...
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Let Me Convince You
Students examine the elements of a persuasive speech and brainstorm topics related to school that they think should be changed. They compose and deliver a three to five minute persuasive speech to their classmates using the key...
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Final Project Presentations: Water Quality
Pupils synthesize the information they have been researching on water quality to evaluate the potential health risks in a region with arsenic contamination. They prepare and present a persuasive speech that incorporates visuals.
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The Credibility Challenge: In Search of Authority on the Internet
Students identify and interpret the background and practice in determining authority on the Internet. Then they identify how to tell whether an author has expertise or not, and whether they're getting the straight story. Students also...
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Writing Through Reading
Students are introduced to a new method of writing developed by Robert Gay. In groups, they practice retelling or rewriting one of their fellow classmates stories. They are also introduced to the technique of transcribing and write in...
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Heading West
Students study the concept of the westward expansion. In this exploration of the western U.S. instructional activity, students participate in different activities that explain economic hardships, jobs, and land opportunities. Students...
Shakespeare in American Life
"We Few, We Happy Few": Motivational Speech in Henry V
Class members may "think themselves accurs'd" when they first hear of an assignment that asks them to create a motivational speech. After studying the Saint Crispin's Day speech from Shakespeare's Henry V; however, they will count...
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Speakers in Action
Tune into C-Span and tape politicians delivering testimony before congress. Class members view these tapes, formulate a rubric for rating the effectiveness of such a speech, and then emulate best practices and include them in their own...
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Teaching a Short Story
Students work in small groups and prepare an analysis of a short story to be presented to their peers. They research the story and create a handout or a visual aid that cites sources of information and summarizes the main points of the...
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What About Us? Women in the Civil War
Students research the role of women in the Civil War. In this Civil War unit, students research the role women played during the war. This unit includes eight different activities including vocabulary, writing prompts and a literature...
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Presenting Research with PowerPoint
Students organize information and prepare a visual interpretation that enhances an oral presentation using pictures, graphics and sound.
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Night by Elie Weisel
Students read "No News from Auschwitz" and answer the study questions as an introduction to the novel. They record reactions to the essay and compare with reactions after reading "Night".
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What Makes a Cat a Cat?
Students investigate the lives of pets by videotaping them. In this animal life lesson, students videotape a cat and other pets using school cameras in a computer lab. Students review the footage from the cat and other animals and...
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"We few, we happy few": Motivational Speech in Henry V
Learners explore how to write and deliver a motivational speech by examining King Henry's in "Saint Crispin's Day".
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Building Reading Skills: Fluency
Students practice their fluency skills. In this fluency lesson, students read aloud stories to their peers and they help to coach one another on their fluency, pronunciation, phrasing, and inflection. They discuss what makes a good...
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Fifteen Seconds of Fame
A reading of Panic in Paris launches a review of the elements of narrative writing. Class members work in groups to find narrative devices in the book and record their findings on a provided worksheet. Using the completed pages, emergent...
National Council of Teachers of English
Writing Poetry with Rebus and Rhyme
Young scholars write rhyming poems using rebus. With pictures instead of words, authors create original work about things they love.
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Research Project
Students research a given topic and organize information in order to write a report or make an oral presentation. They design and create a visual aid (poster, model, PowerPoint, etc) to help clarify the concepts of their...
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Rock and Poetry: A Thematic Project
Students explore poetry. In this literature activity, students examine music and lyrics by Natalie Merchant in order to make the transition to analyzing poetry by Keats and Wordsworth.
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Changes in Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes
Sixth graders discuss how people, society, and technology change over time through a unit of integrated lessons. In these changes in society lessons, 6th graders discuss the answers to many questions about how changes effect the...
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The 3 Levels of Government through Scrapbooking
Eighth graders explore Parliamentary democracy and governance.