Language learners receive support with the concepts in the Houghton Mifflin Harcourt thematic unit Our Earth from this 32-page packet of exercises and activities designed just for them

Reinforce important reading skills with a set of vocabulary lesson plans. Middle schoolers complete sentences, play word games, finish analogies, and build their growing vocabulary with a packet of helpful and applicable graphic organizers.

Seventh graders have a golden opportunity to learn how to read poems and short stories with a unit that introduces them to the techniques writers use to craft their works. They examine poems by William Carlos Williams and Edgar Allen Poe...

Does Bud use his rules to survive or thrive? That is the driving question of a lesson plan following the reading of Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis. In an argument essay prewriting activity, pupils use textual evidence to...

Help your students to vary their sentence structure with this presenation, which teaches them to use relative pronouns and adjective clauses to change the order of their sentences. The presentation details different ways to write the...

A large part of analyzing or understanding art is knowing how to read about it. The New York Times has put together these who, what, where, when, and how questions to aid learners in comprehending informational pieces related to art and...

If you are looking for a great way to present natural selection in humans, look no further. This handout is intended to accompany the 14-minute video The Making of the Fittest: Natural Selection in Humans, which can be found on the...

Can animals sense an earthquake before the ground starts to shake? Read two short passages that feature stories about animals that acted strangely just before an earthquake. Learners then answer a few reading comprehension questions...

Before honoring courageous veterans, get to know more about who they are and why November 11th is a special day. Scholars obtain such information through a read aloud of Eve Bunting's The Wall, grand conversation, and...

Does jet lag affect a baseball team's performance in games? Read about how a baseball team's chance of winning a game can be affected by traveling over one, two, and three time zones. Readers then respond to five short answer questions...

Prior knowledge is key when starting any novel unit, but it's essential before introducing Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe. Three lessons provide primary documents, historical discussions, and extended reading activities...

What does it mean to be an American citizen? Lieutenant Colonel Commander William Barret Travis believed that it meant honor to country first—even above one's own life. Middle and high schoolers read his final letters from the Alamo that...

Fairy tales seem like quick, fun children's stories, but asking compelling questions about characters, plot elements, and literary themes can transform them into rich and complex tales. Use a series of eight lessons on Hans Christian...

Begin the writing journey of an evidence-based essay detailing a rule to live by with various activities to familiarize learners with the topic and jump-start brainstorming. First, pupils take part in an in-depth review and discussion of...

Young nutritionists plan nutritional meals by using the USDA's Food Guide Pyramid. Before constructing their meal plans, they take a close look a food labels and learn how to decipher them. In today's world of obese and unfit children,...

Stress the importance of authenticating online resources and understanding the sources of websites' information with this activity. Using a Web-based activity, the lesson prompts young learners to think critically about determining the...

Shapes are really neat, and here's a lesson plan that will help learners identify shapes through song, touch, and sight. They sing a shape song as they bounce different shapes around in a parachute. They then read a story and feel each...

Have you ever wanted to tell a character what you really thought of him or her? Use a lesson plan based on Kyoko Mori's Shizuko's Daughter to encourage learners to write a letter in response to a character's actions. 

Shadow puppetry has an ancient past, it is also a great way to build oral expression and reading fluency. Young thespians research folk tales, compare and contrast reality and fantasy, then create and perform a shadow puppet play based...

Albert Bierstadt's painting Wind River Country shows viewers how a reader progresses through a story. Your class studies the light and dark areas, how the eye moves across the painting, and what attracts the audience to the work, and...

Junior ecologists examine Arizona's biotic communities and research an animal or plant that is found in this community. In this lesson, learnerss write a narrative essay about their assigned animal or plant. They research online and in...

Explore communication in this interview skills lesson. English learners identify the techniques native English speakers use when speaking directly to a potential employer. They read handouts detailing seven steps to improve an interview...

Sixth graders investigate local water. In this water cycle lesson, 6th graders take samples from surrounding water sources. Students record data from the samples, compare and graph the results.