Young learners need practice speaking comfortably in front of others. Post a list of oral speaking tips on the board during this unit. Over a week-long period, they create a story from their interview sheet and present it to the class....

Bring up the topic of world hunger in your class with two emotional videos. The short films are about a program for educating and feeding children around the world. Class members talk about poverty and pay close attention to the...

What would the characters of Pride and Prejudice say to each other in a letter? Draft unsent correspondence between characters from Jane Austen's novel. A great way to explore characterization and plot structure in a creative lesson.

Examine the contributions of African-Americans in the worlds of art and literature. Over the course of a few days, young scholars will read and analyze a poem, a short story, and a piece of art. They complete a range of...

Students in a special education classroom use the internet to research the characteristics of the rainforest. Individually, they decide whether to write a short story or poem with a main character who lives in the rainforest. To end the...

Khaled Hosseini’s video “Using Real People and Events” motivates learners to reflect on their own experiences and to use those experiences as the basis of a graphic novel that expresses a universal truth. The richly detailed plan...

Class members are challenged to write a neutral news story about the events they observe in a short video. After sharing their stories in groups and discussing the different perceptions, the class concludes with a video of...

Nanofibers can be made through electrospinning or force spinning in order to reduce the negative impact on the environment. Pupils study the role of fibers and dye on the environment through a series of five hands-on activities. Then,...

Philip Pullman's The Golden Compass provides the text for a study of how writers bring characters to life. Using the provided character mapping worksheets, readers respond to questions and then write a short character sketch.

Read an excerpt from Sonia Mycak's short story A Dual Existence in a Seemingly Singular Country and consider the emotional and social implications of not being able to speak English in Australia. This would be a great activity for EFL...

Using a three-column chart labeled "Character," "Action," and "Trait," pupils analyze the traits of several characters from a short story. The instructional activity is designed for a SMART board, but a teacher could easily do the...

Pupils read the story, "The Polar Express." Prior to beginning the story, students predict events of the story and drink hot cocoa. Afterwards, they write a short story about Christmas and create a model train for the classroom....

Bring Edgar Allan Poe's spooky story to life! After reading the short story "The Tell-Tale Heart," middle and high schoolers identify the theme, character traits, irony, and other story concepts. During pre-reading, they take notes,...

Explore Chinese culture and customs with your class and allow them time to connect and compare their own experiences with experiences of character a from the short story The All-American Slurp. They create a short presentation on some...

Students design and create an experimental film to express a theme or concept regarding heroism. They establish shots of locations, write dialogue, create montages and subjective footage.

Students discuss the characteristics of the literary genre known as "Southern Gothic". They write an analysis of the short story, "A Good Man is Hard to Find" by Flannery O'Connor.

Students write about an artifact that they are studying. In this artifacts lesson plan, students analyze details of the artifact and answer short answer questions about it.

Students brainstorm animals with unusual characteristics such as a giraffe with a short neck or a zebra without stripes. They write paragraphs about their animals and work in peer editing groups to refine their stories.

Students practice recognizing the elements needed to produce a piece of creative writing and become aware of those elements in their own original pieces of writings. In groups, they creatively write a new story utilizing all the major...

In this writing to analyze, comment and review worksheet, students analyze blurbs, comment on the openings and endings of novels, and review a book from their own choosing. Students answer seventy short answer questions.

Make a study of good and evil by examining a short legend. After reading, learners compose their own stories and participate in a class discussion about the text, the characters, and the message of the reading.

Students consider various perspectives in writing and write a short story. They view a painting and discuss its theme and the idea of personification as perspective. Choosing three different viewpoints, they write a story about the...

Students criticially read an unfinished creative writing piece, answer factual questions concerning the piece, and then finish the story or create their own story about their own neigborhood and possible environmental issues.

Students complete a variety of activities related to the short /u/ sound. As a class they recite a tongue twister, then trace and write the letter U. Students then listen to a list of words and identify the words containing the short...