Readers learn to ask questions about text with an activity based on Ernest Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea. As they read, class members craft questions based on Bloom's Taxonomy and then find the answers themselves.

A 190-page anthology explores the life and parts of plants, flowers, and trees while boosting reading comprehension skills. Literature and informational texts showcase Johnny Appleseed and George Washington Carver. Lessons...

The thematic read-aloud anthology introduces young readers to life on a farm. The thoughtfully detailed resource offers three weeks of skills practice designed to boost reading comprehension skills. Lessons follow a routine of...

A read-aloud anthology presents texts about the ancient Roman civilization. Lessons introduce readings, followed by a discussion and extension activities—word work, comprehension practice, and more. Writing focuses on opinion pieces, and...

Learn about the government's role in everyday life in a guided reading activity. Groups create a KWL chart concerning the government's impact on the community.

There are many different ways to build accuracy and fluency when reading. This exercise employs repetition and timed drills to get the job done. Learners time each other as they read a passage, recording each other's time and accuracy.

Before you begin your unit on William Shakespeare's The Tempest, introduce the themes of the play with a lesson based on the biblical story of Joseph. Taking your high schoolers through selected text from Genesis 17-44,...

“Thou know’st ‘tis common; all that lives must die/Passing through nature to eternity.” Grief, and the response to grief and loss, is the focus of a series of activities that uses Hamlet as a launchpad. Groups examine Act I, scene ii to...

How many times did it take Thomas Edison to invent a successful working lightbulb? Young learners read a short passage about this famous inventor and his determination in getting an idea to work successfully. Then, pupils respond to four...

John Knowles' A Separate Peace provides readers with an opportunity to develop their close reading and analytical skills as they look for what Knowles feels are the factors that shape our identity.

Good readers have internalized a system of strategies to understand text. While most reading programs explicitly teach these strategies, this presentation could be used as a discussion starter to help students understand such things as...

After completing Chapter 5 of Parrot in the Oven: Mi Vida, readers make text-to-self, text-to-text, and text-to-world connections to Victor Martinez's novel by crafting journal entries addressing comments and questions to characters in...

Difficulties with brain injuries still continue today. After reading Phineas Gage: A Gruesome but True Story About Brain Science, class members read a series of modern personal essays about brain injuries and choose an essay to compare...

Check in on the development of your fifth graders' reading and writing skills with this Common Core-designed assessment. Given a series of six reading passages ranging from narrative stories to informational texts, young...

Good readers make connections between texts. The SAT regularly assesses the ability to make those connections using paired reading passages, a topic discussed in an official SAT practice lesson plan on synthesis. During the lesson,...

Readers' theater is a fun way to get kids reading with expression and improve their fluency! There is a full script here for The Three Bears with five characters to assign.

As part of a unit study of Bud, Not Buddy, readers compare Buddy's list of rules to live by with those that Steve Jobs enumerates in his commencement address to Stanford's 2005 graduating class.

Who helps our community run smoothly? Read a short passage about community members and helpers. After kids finish the passage, they answer five short questions on the other side of the page.

What would it like to be the first person to achieve something? Read about Althea Gibson, the first black tennis player to win a Grand Slam title, to win at Wimbledon, and more. Class members respond to questions to demonstrate...

Pairs help each other with reading fluency using phrase flashcards! Learners take turns reading short phrases aloud. They have one minute to read as many correctly as possible while their partner sorts the cards into a yes or no pile. At...

Who are we and what shapes our identities? Seventh graders work to answer this question as they learn how to write a memoir. Full of non-print resources and supplemental texts that range from fiction to non-fiction, scholars write 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...

Looking for a resource that helps learners practice identifying fact and opinion? A four-page activity includes two informational text reading passages. Pupils read each passage and respond to four multiple choice and one...

Where did the falcons go? Scholars read the article Welcome Back which describes the disappearance of falcons due to the use of pesticides. During a second read, learners annotate the text by marking unfamiliar words and facts about...