There are so many authors of short stories, and your class can have the chance to study quite a few. This seventh lesson in a series of fourteen continues the decision-making process for the final assessment: a short story author study....

Designed with many of the Common Core standards in mind, this 10-lesson unit is brimming with ELL strategies, teacher's notes, and the best of core instructional methods for teaching the common elements of folktales, and exploring...

Use a performance task to assess third graders' ability to read informational text. After they plan a lemonade stand business, young entrepreneurs implement that plan through informational writing. The task assumes learners can...

How did the tiger get its stripes? Kindergartners read a Vietnamese folk tale, "How the Tiger Got His Stripes," retold by Rob Cleveland, and work through several reading comprehension and literary analysis activities.

"The Gettysburg Address" is the basis of a series of activities that not only model for learners how to conduct a close reading of a text, but also how a close reading can help them comprehend a difficult text. The detailed, step-by-step...

Elizabeth Cady Stanton was a famous suffragette that paved the way for equal rights for women. Readers respond to before, during, and after reading questions based on her story. The resource is a great addition to a lesson plan...

What was everyday life like in Colonial Virginia? To find the answer cooperative groups work collaboratively to read an informational handout and complete a graphic organizer. The speaker of the group then shares their new-found...

Give credit where credit is deserved. Scholars discuss what makes a credible source as they take a look at "An Apparel Factory Defies Sweatshop Label, but Can It Thrive?" Learners read the article to look for answers to the research...

Hold a discussion in writing about coping strategies to prepare your pupils for reading Phineas Gage: A Gruesome but True Story About Brain Science by John Fleischman. After journaling, pupils come up in an organized fashion and write...

Track the poetic elements in any text with a guided reading worksheet. Kids note examples of consonance, alliteration, onomatopoeia, repetition, rhyme, and rhythm when reading a poem or story, and provide a short explanation as...

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs provides the lens class members use to analyze and evaluate the motivations of the characters in Sylvia Plath's "Initiation" and scenes from Mean Girls. Readers then select a character from A...

After watching a brief instructional video, young mathematicians are put to the test. By completing and reading frequency tables, tally charts, and bar graphs, individuals show their understanding of how to interpret data.

Cinderella is a classic love story when Cinderella is the protagonist—but what happens if a stepsister tells the story? Focus on point of view with a instructional activity about fairy tales and story elements. After reading a few...

Young mathematicians read, interpret, and complete a variety of real-world pictograms. Each question includes a key and information to complete the graphs. 

Nine lessons makeup a unit designed to reinforce grammar and vocabulary through practice pages based on readings of African folktales. Each lesson consists of a mini lesson, a vocabulary review, and a worksheet. Topics include...

How do humans affect ecosystems? Learners read two articles and interpret a graph to develop essays on the human impact on ecosystems. They read about human impact on tigers and manatees as a basis for their overarching papers.

"Promises Denied," the second instructional activity in a unit that asks learners to consider the responsibilities individuals have to uphold human rights, looks at documents that illustrate the difficulty the US has had trying to live...

How would you feel if you lost your belly button? Read about Billy Brown in Billy Brown and the Belly Button Beastie by Bobby and Sherry Norfolk. Young learners retell the story, answer questions, focus on the letter B and...

It's time for pupils to read, examine, and contemplate literature to explore the difference between vivid and generic verbs. Pupils distinguish between the two types of verbs as they read the ghost scene from Shakespeare's Hamlet. They...

Enhance and extend instruction of "The Story of an Hour" by Kate Chopin with one or all of these ideas. You might want to cover characterization and summary, or improve understanding of context clues and irony. You can cover any...

Young historians examine the work of Martin Luther King Jr. by reading and answering questions about the Montgomery Bus Boycott, the Albany Movement, the Birmingham and Chicago campaigns, and the Memphis Sanitation Worker's Strike....

Pique your pupils' interest before reading Peter and the Starcatchers with an anticipation guide. Given a list of 10 statements, learners choose true or false based on what they think the book is about. They then discuss in small...

Invite your pupils to discover their strengths with a multiple intelligences assessment. They read through several pages of activities and check off the items that apply. Learners then tally up their scores to determine which of the...

Begin your unit on Natalie Babbitt's Tuck Everlasting with a pre-reading activity about the novel's themes. As class members ponder five questions that reflect the book's themes, they talk about their opinions in...