Third graders explore the Ecuadorian Rainforest. In this writing and research lesson students utilize several information sources to learn about the Ecuadorian Rainforest. Students also summarize and paraphrase information learned...

Students explore climate changes. In this climate changes instructional activity, students research what causes changes. Students search the Internet, summarize reports they find and create a poster with the information.

Sixth graders listen to "Sixteen Tons" by Tennessee Ernie Ford and discuss what it means to owe one's soul to a store. In this mathematics lesson, 6th graders determine what a miner's income was minus his expenses graphing findings in a...

  Students read and summarize two different articles that are based on anit-Semitism.  In this Holocaust lesson, students discuss if events in the articles could happen in today's society or not.   

Students perform a series of experiments on gas laws. In this chemistry lesson, students analyze the relationship between temperature, volume and pressure. They create a poster summarizing all the gas laws.

Bring writing into your history course with this exercise on Spanish development and conquest in North America. Five short-answer prompts get students writing about various aspects of Spanish influence. They consider the origin of the...

What are the elements of a personal narrative? Get your class talking by reading "The Necklace" and "A Dangerous Game." The instructional activity focuses primarily on defining certain vocabulary terms (like context clues, plot,...

Students define a summary and discuss the elements of writing a summary. In this summary writing lesson, students take notes while reading a book and use to write a summary.

Fourth graders watch a modeled lesson on summarizing the main ideas of a non-fiction passage. They silently read a passage about sharks before making a class summarization chart. Next, they read a small passage and summarize it...

Students, through teacher modeling and guided practice, explore the five steps/rules of summarizing. Independently, they read a short article and apply the summarization rules and skills (picking out key words, main points, etc.) to...

Students review six steps to follow to correctly summarize a written passage. Through modeling, guided and independent practice they distinguish between unimportant and important information and summarize an article using these steps.

High schoolers summarize the reasons why the U.S. entered World War 2. They view a video on the bombing of Pearl harbor, construct a timeline of WWII events, and evaluate propaganda posters to create their analysis of the start of U.S....

Picture that! Pupils view photographs of the aftermath of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire, discussing what they know and wonder about each image. Then, scholars watch a short video about the historic event and complete a KWL...

Use comic strips to teach sequencing in narrative poetry. As homework, each class member selects a comic strip with 4-8 frames, cuts the frames apart, places the pieces in an envelope, and brings the envelope to class. Class members swap...

Are you teaching Modernism to your class? Connect different areas of artistic expression in the Modernist Era. Learners read T.S. Eliot, view art by Pablo Picasso, and listen to a Modernist musical composition. This final assignment is...

After reading Bel Kaufman's "Sunday in the Park," give your class the opportunity to react to the short story through writing. First they write a brief summary paragraph, and then they react to any events or characters' actions in a...

Integrating quotations, paraphrases, and summaries into a paper can be a challenge. After the terms are defined and the difference among them illustrated, viewers are shown correct and incorrect inclusions of quotations. Preview the...

Beware! (not only the Ides of March). Warn your researchers of the dangers of plagiarism! After defining the term, viewers are introduced to the consequences of and forms of plagiarism, as well as tips on how to avoid plagiarism....

The country of Egypt is more than just big pyramids and ancient pharaohs. After reading a brief overview of this African nation, young learners will demonstrate their understanding of the text by identifying the main idea and supporting...

Early settlers in the American Midwest experienced constant struggle. This reading passage describes for young learners the hardships of homesteaders as they journeyed west and sought to start a new life. When finished, students identify...

Here is a very age appropriate idea that can be stretched, modified, or used as is. Learners review plant parts, discuss pollination, read the story The Tiny Seed, and write a retell sentence. Their sentences describe to way a seed...

This online interactive quiz on 10 Shakespeare plays is unlikely to be useful for your class; however, you could use it as a basis for your own assignment that asks class members to come up with four words to describe an entire work. An...

What does your class know about the news today? They scan several articles found in the July 28, 2011 version of the New York Times, then answer five comprehension questions.

Readers of Orson Scott Card's award-winning science fiction novel, Ender's Game use the provided KWL worksheet to list what they already know about war, what they think they will learn in reading the book, the new information they...