Readers reflect on enjoyable stories they know, brainstorm criteria that make a story "good," analyze a New York Times article about innovative children's performances, re-envision classics on their own, and peer edit drafts. Use this as...

Second graders re-write a story. In this alternate endings lesson, 2nd graders read Alexander and the Wind-Up Mouse, by Leo Lionni, stopping to discuss the events and predict what will happen next. Students work in groups to come up with...

Learners explore how much pleasure reading can bring, explain the concept of "story sequence", "re-tell" a story through art, and read other folktales.

Ensure that your kids don't even consider saying "Not me!" when it comes time to read by engaging them in this set of lesson plans based around "The Little Red Hen." The class reads the story together before starting in on additional...

The memoir A Long Way Gone tells the story of a child soldier during the civil war in Sierra Leone. A crossword puzzle helps reinforce key ideas found in the memoir. The puzzle addresses characters, key events, and other details...

Kids who need extra support with the concepts in the Houghton Mifflin Harcourt thematic unit on silly stories, will benefit from this packet packed with skill builders, activities, exercises, and practice sets.

What could be better than a play within a play? A study guide for "The Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen's Guild Dramatic Society's Production of 'A Christmas Carol'" has theater-goers share their thoughts on the comedic...

Teach your English language learners how to talk about their families with three weeks of lessons. Over the course of the thematic unit, learners pick up new vocabulary so that they can talk about families and relationships, clothing,...

Give this literacy worksheet to your beginning readers to help them draw out key details and retell in their own words. They read a short fantasy story about a bear in space which includes dialogue, onomatopoeia, and a simple story line....

Who is Carl? Carl is a little monster that will help your learners draw and create in any way imaginable. Get those kids to activate creative and imaginative thinking skills with a really fun app. There are endless options that can...

Youngsters retell the story of The Three Billy Goats Gruff. They write a sentence for speech bubbles for a character in the story, identify the phrases that can be used for retelling a story, and in small groups write a sentence for the...

Read this twist on Goldilocks and the Three Bears: Dusty Locks and the Three Bears by Susan Lowell. Kindergartners listen, predict, and discuss the story. They then participate in a dramatization of the story and draw a picture...

Thirty-six pages familiarize scholars with the story and vocabulary of A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. After reading and listening to an abbreviated version of the holiday tale learners show what they know about the sequence...

Every culture has its own stories to tell. An interesting educator's guide shares a large collection of fairytales and folktales, some from different cultures and some re-creations of classics. A summary and brief teaching ideas...

In this storytelling instructional activity, children practice re-telling the story of "How Bear Lost His Tale", review and write out the story sequence, and learn about homophones like tail/tale, sail/sale, etc. Extension activities for...

When scholars re-tell a story, do they boil it down to important details in a logical order? Practice summarizing narratives using this think-aloud strategy, which is scripted here for your convenience. After explaining why this is an...

Make your learners' stories the best they can be. Use this resource to help them identify and discuss the importance of an engaging opening for their stories. This presentation goes through a series of tips and examples to help make this...

Practice descriptive writing with a prompt that includes a photograph. Writers craft the whole story of the single second caught in a photo using the provided questions to prompt their imaginations. 

Start kids thinking about point of view and autobiographies by telling them a short story about your morning (first person), and then asking a volunteer to re-tell the story to you (second person). There are tips to help you tie this...

As your authors prepare to write a hypothetical novel, they need all the inspiration they can find! Using a book they have already read (and enjoyed), learners complete a literary analysis by filling in eight short-answer...

Primary learners grasp sequence of events by discussing morning routines and reviewing the story of Little Red Riding Hood. They explore the necessity of correct order of events. As a class, create a story with a beginning, middle, and...

Teaching young learners about similes is easy as pie with this primary grade language arts lesson plan. Following a class reading of the children's book, Quick as a Cricket by Audrey Wood, young readers learn the definition of a...

Here's a packet designed especially for those kids who need extra support with the basic concepts in the Houghton Mifflin Harcourt thematic units on American stories.

Animals are the theme of this series of challenge activities. Extend scholars' learning opportunities by writing personal narratives and book reports, creating picture and alphabet books, and drawing scenes from stories read aloud.