Is a college education necessary for success in today's world? The class investigates the question, along with others at the end of the sixth workshop in a 15-part series. The lesson has four parts with multiple activities and...

Spark interest in Mark Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer with an anticipatory exercise that begins with a brainstorm around the words heroic and good boy. Pupils then complete an anticipation guide, discuss the results in groups, and...

Third graders participate in activities to differentiate fiction from nonfiction.  In this fiction lesson, 3rd graders describe the elements of a fiction story.  Students compare and contrast fiction and non fiction elements....

In this World Tourism Day worksheet, students complete activities such as read the passage, match the phrases, fill in the blanks, choose the correct word, multiple choice fill in, correct the spelling, put text in correct order,...

Students consider how cause and effect translate into sequencing in literary works. In this sequencing lesson plan, students read non-fiction passages about Eleanor Roosevelt and Clara Barton. Students complete graphic organizers based...

Learners examine the writing techniques of professional authors and apply them to their own work. In pairs, they email authors to discover the tricks of the trade. Students create their own Website for their work.

High schoolers select a theme-related essay topic from Night, by Elie Wiesel, or The Metamorphosis, by Franz Kafka, and develop an essay that relates the theme to modern-day personal experiences. The essay follows a preset rubric...

Students use description language to clarify ideas and create vivid images in an essay focusing of strong verbs. They discuss weak verbs and explore that the better image the words create, the better the reader understands the text.

Caption this! Scholars complete the end of unit assessment by rereading In the Middle of the Storm. Learners answer written response questions about the text, and then create drawings to accompany their work. To finish, they caption...

Students become familiar with the hardships of mothers during the Great Depression. They also gain an understanding of the literary style of monologue and first-person point of view through creating their own monologues in response to a...

Your class can take turns describing a well know location or setting without giving its name, and the rest of the class can try to identify the location, based on the details given.  They chart the elements that helped in the...

Close the unit on Esperanza Rising with an in-class analytic essay on how Esperanza changes over the course of the novel. Writers can use any of their notes and work from the unit as well as their drafts of the first two paragraphs of...

Explore Washington Irving's "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" in this literature analysis lesson. Middle schoolers read and summarize the plot of the story. They then adapt passages for a contemporary audience and analyze the...

Analyze point of view and how it affects a literary work with this lesson. Middle schoolers create a written piece that focuses on point of view. They review the literary term "point of view," and explore examples of the term in text....

What caused the collapse of the environment on Rapa Nui (Easter Island)? Who constructed the Moai? What was their purpose? Class members assume the role of investigators and use evidence drawn from field studies, ships' logs, and...

Logan’s Lament, a speech delivered by Mingo Chief Logan in 1774, provides pupils with an opportunity to not only study the historical events surrounding the battle between Native Americans and the Europeans for the West Virginia...

The Labrador retriever is America's most popular dog breed. With the novel study for The Summer of Riley by Eve Bunting, scholars learn more about the sweet, lovable animal. Additionally, they write quatrain poems, explore foreshadowing...

Here’s a fresh approach to establishing classroom rules at the beginning of the school year. Class groups brainstorm what they know about rules for baseball, basketball, and football. They then consider how the games would differ without...

“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.”  Readers of The Stranger rate Mersault’s moral development (or lack thereof) using Kohlberg’s Theory of Moral Development scale. Using...

Good question are the heart of great discussions. To prepare for a book club discussion, introduce young readers to the characteristics of good conversation-starting questions. Practice crafting questions for a text the class has...

Students listen to and read legends and see that these legends helped the Aboriginals explain their everyday life. Through their stories and legends we find that Aboriginal values, attitudes and cultural identities are shared.

Tenth graders read and analyze the first two chapters of the novel, 'Bless Me, Ultima.' They respond to a partners journal entry, discuss the two major landscapes in the novel, and create a drawing/interpretation of what these landscapes...

Tenth graders prepare to read Bless Me, Ultima as they study the Southwestern region of the United States. They examine the characters, setting, and culture by using context clues, and participate in a jigsaw activity.

Middle schoolers produce an ongoing journal in which they relate their personal response to literature. They examine the theme of the rights of the individual versus the whole. They explore conflict in Panther in the Basement.