21 x 20 Media
A+ Writing Prompts
Shake it up! Shake your tablet to bring up a unique writing prompt for journaling or blogging with your class. Shake again and a new one appears. Prompts can come from different categories (sketches, scenes, texts, words, news) to help...
Curated OER
The Magic Opera
Introduce your young learners to opera by dressing up as Mozart and recounting some of the fascinating details of his life and music. After exploring the Metropolitan Opera's site for kids, the class listens to a reading of Kyra...
Curated OER
Making the Old New Again
How does a new version of a Shakespearean play change in the adaptation process? Use this New York Times' Learning Network lesson to consider texts that have been produced in different media. Middle schoolers examine the latest version...
Curated OER
A New Point of View
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....
Scholastic
Hill of Fire Teaching Plan
Some books are perfect for drawing connections between multiple subjects. The book Hill of Fire becomes the hub for three very different, yet related activity ideas. First the class hones their oral language skills by creating an...
Speak Truth to Power
Jamie Nabozny: Bullying: Language, Literature and Life
Class members identify bullying in contemporary texts and role play how they might change those scenes to examples of anti-bullying. They then re-define their initial definitions of bullying and discuss what they would like to see as...
Penguin Books
A Teacher's Guide to the Signet Classics Edition of Macbeth by William Shakespeare
Double, double scholars' appreciation of the Scottish Play with a guide that adds a rich brew of pre-reading background information, chapter discussion questions, activities, and writing prompts to provide readers with a "firm and good"...
PBS
Inventions
Use this lesson plan to discuss inventions that have changed your class's world and have impacted society. Middle schoolers investigate important inventions of their time and design an invention in a simulated business atmosphere. Modify...
Curated OER
Revolutionary News Network
Seventh graders study events leading to, during and resulting from the American Revolution. They review elements of a political cartoon. They create and dramatize a scene from a Revolutionary War novel.
Curated OER
NOTHING TO LEAR BUT LEAR HIMSELF
Students read a scene from King Lear and decide collaboratively how best to present it. In doing so, they examine the scenes and the play from multiple perspectives.
Curated OER
Continuing Story
Learners interpret scenes from a novel they are reading. In this literature lesson, students select scenes from The Stone Cutter to perform for their classmates. Learners should attempt to recreate the emotions that think the characters...
Curated OER
Journey and Change: The Migrant and Immigrant Experience
Students look carefully at two photographs by Dorothea Lange that relate to the universal theme of a journey. They identify parallels between Lange's photographs and two poems. They write about the theme of journey as it relates to their...
Curated OER
Consider How Their Thoughts Changed the World
Students research a woman who changed the world, and then consider the ways her life might influence their own. They access websites and videos about these women which are imbedded in the plan.
Curated OER
Scenes from Cameroon
Students examine art by a Peace Corps volunteer in Cameroon. Using the artwork, they identify three physical land features. They use sand and other materials to create their own day or evening scene in Cameroon. They share their...
Curated OER
Toilet Paper Roll Nativity Scene
In this Christmas craft worksheet, students gather materials and follow directions to construct a Nativity scene out of toilet paper tubes.
Curated OER
A Change of Scene
Pupils evaluate their school's theater space. They study about the renovations to the University of Michigan's Hill Auditorium by reading and discussing the article "Michigan's Gem of an Auditorium Glitters Again." They then determine...
Curated OER
How Prophet-able Are You? Ancient Advocates for Change
High schoolers read and analyze classical literature of the ancient Hebrew prophets dealing with societal injustices. They identify present-day prophets, and write an essay about how the common good would be affected if people listened...
Literacy Design Collaborative
To Be or Not to Be: The Evolution of Hamlet’s Personality
How does Hamlet's state of mind change over the course of Shakespeare's most famous revenge tragedy? After a close reading of Hamlet's soliloquies in Act III, scene 1 and Act IV, scene iv, class members engage in a Paideia/Socratic...
Maryland Department of Education
The Concept of Identity Lesson 5: Motivation - Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs
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 Separate...
Lesson Locker
Hamlet: Act 5 Questions for Study
Explore the resolution of Hamlet with these 21 explorations of the two scenes of Act 5. There is a complex cause-and-effect question concerning the final scene that could be used as an essay prompt.
Curated OER
Welcome to Our Show: The Importance of Being Eager
Lead your class on an exploration of plays. This presentation shows learners how to take a story and change it into a play. It focuses on the use of dialogue. This resource could be used by a variety of grade levels.
Curated OER
Figurative Language Alive: Balcony Scene Charades
Learners act out lines from Romeo and Juliet in a charade-like game.
Curated OER
Convergence with The Cay: Exploring Geographic Concepts Wrapped in a Story
Here's an awesome unit that uses The Cay as the anchor text. The 16-page packet is loaded with teaching ideas, activities, and suggested adjustments.
Annenberg Foundation
The Search for Identity
Discover how writers express identity in their writing. Learners explore how issues of identity surface in the literature of minority writers. Scholars watch a video, read and discuss biographies, conduct research, engage in creative...