What's the difference between summarizing and paraphrasing? Show class members how to find the main ideas from informational text and condense it, restate it, or quote it directly with a series of educational activities based...

What's the difference between hibernation and a good nap? Find out with an engaging life science activity that compares the hibernation habits of grizzly bears and marmots. After learners read an informational passage about each mammal,...

High schoolers synthesize the information they've learned from each chapter of Natalie Babbitt's Tuck Everlasting with a creative summarizing activity. With a graphic organizer for all of the book's chapters, readers title...

Who are the Grimke sisters? Scholars find out with a activity that details the struggles and triumphs of the lives of Angelina and Sarah Grimke. After reading an informational text, class members have the opportunity to show what they...

Provide scholars with an opportunity to practice summarizing text with a two-page learning exercise. Learners read poems, share stories with their peers, and summarize their new-found-knowledge. 

Prepare your class for a unit on Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles with an activity that works for pre-reading, during reading, and post-reading. Learners fill out a K-W-H-L chart to reflect on what they already know, what...

Help young learners understand friendship and empathy with two reading comprehension lessons. Each lesson focuses on a story about a child with autism, and encourages readers to compare and contrast the characters to each other and to...

Making inferences and drawing conclusions is a key component to successful active reading. Encourage your class to use context clues and prior knowledge to infer different elements of a story, including the setting, plot, and character...

Explication may sound like a fancy word, but it's just a fancy way to say analysis. Using a handout on poetry explications, part of a larger series on specific writing assignments, writers learn how to break down and analyze a poem. The...

Challenge pupils to read informational text about the Silk Road. Scholars then take their newfound knowledge to answer a mix of eight fill-in-the-blank and multiple-choice questions. Report details appear at the end.

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.

Lies, deceit, betrayal, criminality: these topics are just a few of the reasons that John Steinbeck's classic novel The Grapes of Wrath has captivated people since its 1939 publication. Scholars begin the lesson by reading...

Learn about the animals of Australia with a language arts lesson about an Australian folktale called, Why Koala Has a Stumpy Tail. After reading the story as a class, kids discuss events and characters from the book, retell the...

Using context clues is an effective way to define unfamiliar words. Encourage elementary learners to look at the sentences around the word in question, with a short informative slideshow presentation.

The class explores the truths and lies regarding Zach's Lie through a well-written anticipation guide. First in a series of seven resources, the guide addresses themes within the text. The class collaboratively discusses their...

How confident are your readers in responding to short reading passages? Find out with a worksheet that reinforces reading comprehension skills and requires self reflection on one's ability to read and answer questions...

Bring Julius Caesar to life with a reader's theatre approach that engages the entire class. The opening exercises model the importance of reading with expression while choral reading exercises permit class members to practice their...

An interactive lesson introduces readers to allusions, the literary device writers use to add depth to their work. Users record notes on the provided graphic organizer as they identify the allusions in poems by Walt Whitman, Langston...

Ready, set, act! Using the fun resource, pupils patriciate in a vocabulary charades activity to practice key terms from the unit. Next, scholars work in expert research groups to read an article about the invention of the traffic signal...

How do incidents in A Mighty Long Way provoke the author, Carlotta Walls LaNier, to make certain decisions that shape her story? Scholars engage in a close reading of the memoir, analyzing events in US history and Carlotta's personal...

For this reading for information worksheet, students read a one page passage from the Mayo Clinic about taking care of the common cold. Students answer 8 multiple choice questions about the information.

Fourth graders work individually or in a small group to (1) read a fictional passage, (2) practice test-taking strategies, and (3) practice using context clues to increase their vocabulary. Reading passage and comprehension questions...

Fourth graders work independently or in a small group with a tutor or teacher to (1) read a nonfictional selection, (2) practice drawing conclusions, (3) identify main ideas, and (4) practice responding to cause and effect questions.

Fourth graders work independently or in a small group to (1) read a fictional passage, (2) use context clues to define unfamiliar vocabulary, (3) use comprehension strategies, and (4) make inferences. Reading passages and comprehension...