The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is one of the best-known pieces of American literature. An eBook from the Library of Congress provides access to an early edition of the text. Original layout and illustrations are preserved within.

Relationships between characters generate energy that propels the plot and connects events with a central idea. Track character development and meaningful relationships with a literary analysis lesson focused on H.G. Bissinger's Friday...

Music can help us to access memories and events in a meaningful way, and Francis Scott Key used specific words to convey what he had seen and felt when writing what would become America's national anthem. Help your class connect to...

As your class progresses through Chapter four of Ethan Frome, provide them with these thought-provoking questions built using Bloom's Taxonomy. 

Explore water transport in plant stems using this fun experiment! Your scientists will start by reading Stems by Vijaya Bodach. Then, activate prior knowledge about plant stem functions and water transportation....

Students practice techniques to help them be able to read faster, smoother and with expression. They read and reread a text in order to become more familiar with the words in the passage. Each student is given a copy of "Caps for Sale,"...

Explore the text, Cold and Hot, with comprehension strategies for young readers. First, give them a purpose for reading: find out what the boy wore outside in the snow! Then have them use one-to-one matching and picture clues to...

Do you like music? Have your youngsters read We Play Music, practicing select reading strategies, like using picture clues to determine new words. Then, after their first independent read, have them re-read the story to a...

Reinforce comprehension of informational text. This is a one-on-one lesson intended to build an internal dialogue the reader can use to boost overall comprehension. They work independently with a tutor or teacher to read a nonfiction...

To help learners better comprehend informational texts, they work through a series of activities. They discuss strategies, make predictions, skim passages, focus on key words, and practice taking notes. This lesson focuses on what to do...

Fifth graders read a book.  In this informational text features lesson plan, 5th graders define captions and their purpose.  Students view an article and discuss the graphic aides that assist comprehending the information...

The value of this presentation is that it not only defines background knowledge but includes exercises that show readers how to activate and use what they already know about a topic to make text-to-self, text-to-text, and text-to-world...

Based on Alex Haley's moving essay "My Furthest Back Person: The African," these 11 questions support comprehension and prepare readers for discussion of the text. Use this tool, and the essay, as a nonfiction addition to units on...

Though the discrete content here is a pair of New York Times articles about a 1998 military strike on Iraq and the coincident impeachment by the House of Representatives of then-President Clinton, this detailed plan for creating,...

Your budding readers know what it's like to get to a word and think, "What does that mean?" Expand their vocabulary in context using Christopher Mitten's nonfiction picture book Firefighters. Get them ready by pre-teaching the new...

The loggerhead turtle is a fascinating species, and budding readers learn all about it in Nicola Davies' account One Tiny Turtle. This informational narrative offers excellent vocabulary in context, and you'll...

Show your class how to read a map and decipher all of the markings and features. Start out by connecting maps to their homework from the night before and their current reading, in this case That Book Woman, and a related informational...

Bring this lesson on hubris to your short story unit. After reading Jack London's "To Build a Fire," young readers discuss the role of hubris in the protagonist's death. The lesson has connections to other short stories, such as "The...

A theme runs through it. Scholars analyze how a common theme runs through the myths they have read and The Lightning Thief. They complete graphic organizers and view a four paragraph model essay. They analyze the essay for structure and...

Character analysis can help readers feel more connected to a literary text. Scholars explore the topic by writing an acrostic poem about the main character from Katherine Paterson's novel, Lyddie. Then, pupils watch a short video to help...

Students conduct field research of a historical site in order to discover a more complete understanding of a time period. They choose one particular historical figure and write a short poem about the site from the historical person's...

Identify the main idea and the supporting details of a story in a literacy resource from Discovery Education. Complete with procedures, vocabulary, and assessment activities, this is a great way for pupils to practice their outlining...

Philip Pullman's The Golden Compass provides the text for a study of how writers bring characters to life. Using the provided character mapping worksheets, readers respond to questions and then write a short character sketch.

Learn how to summarize by identifying main ideas and supporting details. Readers cross out unimportant information as they read through a text. Is it a random detail? Cross it out! They then draw a concept map, placing the main idea in...