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Frame Story "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County"
Mark Twain's frame story, "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County" provides an opportunity for a study of this story-within-a-story pattern. Using an illustrated template, class members record a plot summary of the frame story...
Syracuse City School District
Summary of Fiction and Non-Fiction Text
Somebody Wanted But So Then (SWBST)? Yes! Here's a great strategy for teaching young readers how to summarize narrative text. In addition, the packet includes exercises that show kids how to summarize nonfiction text using the classic...
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Create a Playbill!
Seventh graders explore the various elements found in the advertisement of a dramatic experience. Playbills are created that reflect the plot without revealing the climax of the play. Costumes, set construction, and character description...
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What a Character!
Students look at the role of characters in a story. In this character lesson, students discuss how different types of characters change the plot of the story. They see how storytellers use their body, face, and voice to tell stories.
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Map It Out
Explore how illustrations add to a story. Young learners will look at picture books to see how the pictures tell the story. They create illustrations to go with a chosen story, and then flip the activity so they have to write a story to...
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Pigs: A Visual Splendor
Third graders practice using visualization to aid in their reading comprehension. After a reading a chapter from the book "Charlotte's Web," students write a brief summary of the plot using their visualizations, aided by reading...
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Introduce: Summarizing Narrative Text
When scholars re-tell a story, do they boil it down to important details in a logical order? Practice summarizing narratives using this think-aloud strategy, which is scripted here for your convenience. After explaining why this is an...
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Plot and Conflict
Young scholars review the literary elements of plot and conflict. In this plot and conflict lesson plan, students read a story and answer questions about the plot and conflict within. Young scholars create a concept map for the novel to...
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Literature Study Guide: To Kill a Mockingbird
Teaching tools designed to support student-centered literature study. Geared toward homeschoolers reading Harper Lee's book To Kill a Mockingbird, I would use these in my classroom. The materials are applicable to any text: graphic...
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What Did I Just Read
Fourth graders write a summary for each chapter as they read a novel. They summarize the author's purpose and point of view after completing the novel. They also describe about how the author's point of view affected the novel.
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Bringing Facts Into Science Fiction
Students develop a setting, plot and characters for a science fiction story based on current news themes, and then individually write drafts of the story.
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Teachers See the Truth but Wait: Teaching Short Stories with Literature Circles
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...
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Tortoise and Hare Races
Practice basic map skills with the story of The Tortoise and the Hare. After listening to the story, class members create a map that indicates the starting line, the path the animals took, where they stopped to rest, and the finish line....
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Verdi
Third graders explore language arts by answering study questions about a book they read. In this reading summary instructional activity, 3rd graders read the book Verdi by Janell Cannon and identify the plot, characters and sequence of...
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The Frog and the Ol' Black Fly
Students explore frogs. For this cross curriculum literacy and frogs lesson, students predict the plot and then listen to the book The Wide-Mouthed Frog by Keith Faulkner. Students define "predator" and identify foods a frog might eat. ...
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Summarizing is Fun with Flat Stanley!
Students read the book "Flat Stanley" by Jeff Brown. Through modeling and guided practice, as a class, they complete a story map and 1-paragraph summary of the first chapter in the book. Then, in groups, they follow the same procedure...
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In a Nutshell....
Students examine how to summarize the most important details in a reading passage in order to increase their comprehension. They design a story web using the summarization skills. Before class, they complete a reading assignment prior to...
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Summarizing Puts the Pieces Together
Learners summarize a piece of fiction. After reviewing the correct way to read and summarize, students work in groups to summarize a piece of text assigned by the instructor. They write a summary paragraph by creating a story map and...
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Ecology
Students personify ecology vocabulary and write a one-act play using their knowledge of ecology as the basis for characters, conflict, setting and plot.
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Punctuating Dialogue
Sixth graders use narrative strategies (e.g., dialogue and action) to develop characters, plot and setting and maintain a consistent point of view. They create and accurately punctuate dialogue necessary to help the plot progress,...
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Cuentos
Students revise Spanish mystery stories. They sequence the events from a group's mystery story and suggest revisions for the setting. They revise their stories using the suggestions from classmates and describe characters in folktales....
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Create a Playbill!
Students examine the variety of elements for a written play and create a playbill. They read about and define literary elements on a worksheet, and participate in a dramatic reading. Each student then creates and publishes a playbill.
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Children's Book
A great way to publish students' stories is by having them create a picture book using Pages. This simple lesson plan has them take a short story they have written and create a book with a title page and dedication. After they have...
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Pinky and Rex and the Just Right Pet
Students engage in reading comprehension activities for the story "Pinky and Rex and the Just Right Pet". In this reading comprehension lesson plan, students make prediction drawings before reading the story, create new illustrations for...