With so many books to choose from, it can be hard for young readers to find the right one. Help children overcome this problem with this list of rules for identifying books that are too easy, too hard, and those that are just...

In order to truly understand The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, you'll need to provide middle schoolers with background information about the Holocaust. After contributing as many words as they can associate with the Holocaust, such as...

Spoil, brown, poison. Designed to help develop phonemic awareness, the conscious awareness of the sound structure of words, readers are asked to identify and highlight the /oi/ sound in a list of 30 words. They then practice reading...

As part of a phonemic awareness exercise, kids identify and highlight the /er/ sound in a list of 59 words and then read these words to an adult. The activity is the sixth in a series of 16 resources designed to develop the...

Then, bread, set. Help readers develop the conscious awareness of the sound structure of words with an exercise that features the /e/ sound. Kids develop phonemic awareness by identifying and highlighting the /e/ sound in a list of words...

A Reading Closely: Guiding Questions handout leads readers to discover the gist of The Omnivore’s Dilemma. While reading, pupils look closely at the words in the text and discuss their meaning. They use dictionaries when needed to answer...

This New York Times Learning Network exercise provides a cloze exercise along with a word bank that readers can use to complete the passage about the television show, "The Voice" and Jermaine Paul, a recent winner. Another option is...

Go beyond a traditional word search with a clue matching, word search combo. Scholars read clues, write the word that matches, then search for the word in a puzzle. Clues and words offer insight into the life of polar bears.

The Magic Pot by Patricia Coombs is the theme of this multidisciplinary lesson plan. Early readers first take part in a read aloud and grand conversation about the story's details. Then, they get to work practicing their skills in...

Words carry baggage. In addition to their literal, denotative meaning, words also carry the weight of the associations and connotations attached to the word—the connotations of words writers use to create the tone of a piece. An...

Here is a vocabulary worksheet in which your scholars determine the meaning of 10 words using context clues from short readings. They choose from among four words and write their answers on the blank lines at the bottom of the page. They...

Make learning Latin roots a game! After you have introduced the roots fin, sed, and fer, learners can use this word search to build their vocabulary. (Within the word search are words containing these roots.) You can further the activity...

Word builders. Scholars participate in a mini lesson about affixes. They then complete a research vocabulary organizer and share their definitions of the words with the class. They gather more evidence for their research from the...

Practice using word blends and learning about word families by participating in a class game. Learners will collaborate as teams in a game by throwing beanbags onto a shower curtain with word blends on it. They will say the sound their...

Why is reading a text closely a helpful skill? Using the 13th of 20 lessons from the Grade 8 ELA Module 1, Unit 2 series, scholars continue reading the informational text "Refugee and Immigrant Children: A Comparison." They work with...

Check out a resource made up of two separate exercises. The first page lists a series of higher-level questions about "The Inn of Lost Time" by Lensey Namoika. Use the questions to encourage discussion or as an assessment. Since they...

Readers have the opportunity to bring the words from an excerpt of Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass to life. They use strategies from the Storyteller’s Toolbox anchor chart as a guide and then work in pairs to prepare...

What do a girl in foster care and a 91-year-old widow have in common? A crossword puzzle related to Orphan Train highlights some of the similarities the two characters share in the book. The puzzle pulls out key details from the novel to...

"We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union..." These familiar lines begin the Preamble to the Constitution, but do learners know what they mean? A close reading exercise takes a look at the language of the...

On-demand isn't just for TV anymore. Writers complete their end of the unit assessment with an on-demand writing task. They read the article Television and answer questions about the gist, vocabulary, and content. They then complete a...

Looking for a lesson that teaches class members how to analyze nonfiction? Use Joseph McCarthy's famous "Enemies from Within" speech as a instructional text. Worksheet questions direct readers' attention to the many historical...

Video games may not be so bad after all. As scholars read the text "The Many Benefits, for Kids, of Playing Video Games," they summarize the gist in their researchers' notebooks. Next, pupils draft supporting research questions based on...

The political, social, and economic challenges the European Union faces as it enlarges is the focus of a six-lesson unit. Class members investigate and craft a presentation about a member country, the treaties member states must...

To prepare for the Exploring the World Performance Task, class groups generate a list of places they would like to explore, examine images of seven natural wonders of the world, and consider why these sites are wondrous. A map and images...