Unit Plan
CommonLit

Common Lit: East German Man Receives Contest Prize 45 Years Later

For Students 7th - 8th
CommonLit.org is a wonderful resource to use in a Language Arts classroom. Each story or article is accompanied by guided reading questions, assessment questions, and discussion questions. In addition, students can click on words to see...
Activity
Read Works

Read Works: The Paper Airplane Contest

For Teachers 2nd
[Free Registration/Login Required] A literary text about a class that has a paper airplane contest. A question sheet is available to help students build skills in reading comprehension.
Activity
Read Works

Read Works: News Debate Battle of the Binge

For Teachers 7th Standards
[Free Registration/Login Required] An informational text arguing for and against competitive eating contests. A question sheet is available to help students build skills in reading comprehension.
Website
Other

Rube Goldberg Machine Contests

For Students 9th - 10th
This is the home site for the Rube Goldberg Machine Contest. The competition is on to see who can build the zaniest machines. Read about machine ideas, contest winners, and how to build a Rube Goldberg Machine.
Activity
Read Works

Read Works: The Cutest Animal Finalists

For Teachers 1st - 3rd Standards
[Free Registration/Login Required] This passage shares the information about animals that students have voted as being "the cutest" in a Weekly Reader contest. This passage is a stand-alone curricular piece that reinforces essential...
Website
Library of Congress

Library of Congress: read.gov: Educators

For Students Pre-K - 1st
Parents and teaches can encourage reading with these author webcasts and links to teaching resources for novels, poetry, writing contests, and more.
Website
Other

Uil: Speech and Debate (Texas Only)

For Students 9th - 10th
Section of the University Interscholastic League's home page dedicated to Speech and Debate information. Included is a wealth of information about participating in speech and debate tournaments and contests. Topics include general...
Activity
Other

Merlyn's Pen

For Students 9th - 10th
This is the official site of Merlyn's Pen, a magazine publishing student writing. It provides links for submitting student writing, thousands of published entries for your reading pleasure, a list of contests for students to enter,...
Activity
Penguin Publishing

Penguin Random House: Random House Kids

For Students 2nd - 6th Standards
This comprehensive publisher site links to interesting activities, author biographies, synopsis of books, and links to other sites. Games, recommended reading levels, and writing activities provided for students. Teachers resources are...
Website
PBS

Pbs Kids: Writers Contest: Story Central

For Students Pre-K - 1st
Stories by young writers grades K-3. Students can log in and keep their own writing materials or create "mashups" using elements from the stories provided here.
eBook
LM Digital Media

Kids World Fun: Hero of the Mountain [Pdf]

For Students K - 1st
Bubba is off to the contest for Hero of the Mountain, but on the way, he stops to help others. Will he make it to the mountain in time for the contest?
Website
Other

Mystery Net Kids Mysteries: Mysteries by Kids Winners

For Students 2nd - 8th Standards
This site offers links to the winning stories from MysteryNet's mini-mystery writing contest for kids. They provide good reading practice and/or models for story writing activities.
Activity
Other

Danielle's Place: Bible Theme Crafts for Kids

For Teachers Pre-K - 1st
If you teach religion to elementary students, then you have to see this site! It is overflowing with creative ideas to use in your classroom and will get your students excited about the Bible. Many of these lessons also integrate math,...
Unit Plan
Scholastic

Scholastic: Write It: Memoir

For Students 9th - 10th Standards
Write It Memoir offers a complete writing workshop to develop your personal story. Search your memory through the brainstorming activities to launch your piece. Draft a map of the memories along with reading other models. As the process...
Website
Other

Pictures of the Year

For Students 9th - 10th
For over 63 years POI has offered photographers to submit their images to be judged on an international level. It also provides an archive of incredible images for all to see.