While music lyrics are often used to teach literary elements, the richness of this resource comes from the wealth of exercises, activities, and support materials provided in the packet.  Although designed for gifted learners, the...

Once upon a time are four words most children are familiar with when reading a fairy tale. But do they know that fairy tales are a great way to learn the literary elements of reading and writing? Use a thorough fairy tale unit...

Foster contributing members of society with a social studies unit focused on five aspects of community. First graders discuss themes of culture, groups, location, scarcity, and change with discussion questions and activities about...

A unit plan uses short texts to teach literary elements such as theme and characterization. Included are passages by authors such as Walter Dean Myers and Sandra Cisneros. Activities include quick writes, filling in graphic organizers,...

Grammar, vocabulary, and comprehension strategies are all part of the journey toward understanding a text. The last in a series of three extra support lessons designed to accompany Theme 5: One Land, Many Trails provides a wealth of...

The world is a stage, and so is your classroom! Hone the skills of the next generation of Tony® award winners with a set of exercises, reference pages, writing prompts, and excerpts from famous plays.

Provide extra support with a unit that follows a teach, blend, guided practice, and practice/apply routine to reinforce reading, grammar, vocabulary, and writing skills. Reading and writing lessons include supporting details,...

"First Appearance," Mark Twain's tale about overcoming stage fright, serves as a model of a personal narrative and gets young writers thinking about milestones in their own lives. After examining student models and considering the...

A 10-lesson unit takes high schoolers through a novel study of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. To start, students learn about Fitzgerald's background and gain historical context that prepares them for a reading of the book. The...

Good discussion questions, quizzes, and tests teach as well as assess. Readers of The Great Gatsby will learn much from the materials in a 36-page packet designed to help students prepare for the AP Literature exam. Included in the...

Kids who need extra support mastering the concepts in the Houghton Mifflin Harcourt thematic units on journeys, will benefit from the exercises and activities contained in this 40-page resource packet.

Teach learners how to interact with both fiction and non-fiction text with a packet of activities and worksheets. After looking over text structure and the difference in text features between different types of writing,...

Students explore the concept of theme. In this fairy tales lesson, students read several tales and complete hands-on activities, art projects, and dramatic play that lead to an awareness of the themes of the tales.

Students research activities on a festive/seasonal theme. They work on speaking activities like Christmas wishes. They analyze a cross cultural comparison of two festive/seasonal themes. Students include topics like Christmas and pets,...

Whether or not your school/state has adopted the Common Core standards, you will want to add this resource to your Of Mice and Men curriculum materials. The chapter-by-chapter activities ask readers to provide evidence from the novella...

Students search into a variety of story elements in the eight lessons of this unit. The title, author, illustrator, setting, main character, problem, solution, events and the story are the components of the lessons.

Students use literature circles to analyze four short stories from the Realms of Gold, Volume 3. In this literature circle lesson, students are assigned a role in the literature circle to improve their critical thinking skills for...

Students integrate a wide variety of Christmas themes within this lesson. They research the background to the history of this holiday. Students create Christmas cards, crossword puzzles and write creative stories on their special...

Tuck Everlasting by Natalie Babbitt is a classic novel that readers have enjoyed for years. Resources within the study guide such as discussion and guided reading questions, extension activities, and graphic organizers aid...

Students read about Scheherazade and Aladdin and the Enchanted Lamp. In this literature/writing lesson, students understand the excitement of foreign places as the setting for a story. Students rewrite their own version of Scheherazade.

Students explore the the legends and myths of the Orient, Africa, Europe, Asia, and the Americas in this six lessons unit. Different cultures and belief systems of the inhabitants of these areas are examined through storytelling techniques.

How did jazz influence Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man? Class members read some of Ellison's non-fiction writings about blues and jazz, listen to records, watch videos, and engage in student-centered discussions. They then produce podcasts...

Students participate in a lesson that covers the genre of narrative poetry. They examine the elements of a narrative poem while focusing upon the characterization. Students compare and contrast the characters while analyzing their...

Students study fables in a broad context. In this literary lesson on fables, students define terms unique to them. Students use a variety of technological resources to gather and classify information into three categories. Students also...