The works of Carol Ann Duffy, Scottish poet and Britain's 2009 poet laureate, serve as a model for a writing activity that asks class members to select a character card, brainstorm lists of words, phrases, actions, and items associated...

Create a five-paragraph essay easily with the bing, the bang, and the bongo method! Learners write an introduction with the thesis containing three parts. Your three body paragraphs then expand upon each part of the thesis. An example is...

Momoyama and Edo are periods in Japanese history that can be defined culturally and artistically. Learners explore and discuss how the samurai used sword guards and grip enhancers. Pupils read the story "The Inch-High Samurai," examine...

Plagiarism is the theft of intellectual property. To avoid this crime, class members learn how to create a works cited page and how to craft in-text citations. After examining a high-performance model paragraph and an example of a works...

How do pupils relate paired passages to each other? Here's a resource that helps! The lesson includes a short story and a poem as a set of paired reading passages, followed by some analysis questions. It also includes an essay template...

Whodunnit? Find out who killed Mr. Brooks through a logical examination of evidence. Class members fill out a couple of data tables to help them pin down the suspect. After they've figured out just who the culprit is, pupils compose...

Provide Ant-Man with a flying device to aid in fighting crime. The first installment of a five-part unit has learners designing and building a flying device for Ant-Man. They write a narrative essay describing the engineering process...

Schools in the 1950s and 60s looked very different from the schools we know today. An educator's guide explores the civil rights movement and, specifically, the process of integrating schools. Questions cover key themes in the novel and...

To better understand the debate over the 19th Amendment, class members examine two primary source documents that reveal some of the social, economic, racial, and political realities of the time period.

Get the youngest American citizens involved in the presidential election and inauguration with a set of social studies activities. Focusing on the history of presidential inauguration ceremonies, learners draft their own poems, design...

Third through fifth graders discover the importance of reading and plan a service project to provide books to children. First, they read the book The Important Book and then they brainstorm about the importance of reading. Afterward,...

Introduce your young readers to the book review. Groups of writers practice the basic steps of writing a book report and complete an Accordion-Book Summary activity. The lesson includes book report basics and directions to make...

Inspire essay organization with this handout and exercise about outlining. Writers read through a brief outline model and then practice writing their own outline by completing a second model. Scholars not only complete the outline, they...

Begin this activity by asking third graders to bring from home pieces of cloth that represent something important to them. (Have extras for students who need them.) They reflect on important events in their lives, compose narrative...

How do your pupils believe others see them? Invite them to write narratives to explore the image they present to the word. The narratives, inspired by The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, are to be set at each pupil's hypothetical funeral.

Imagine a day in the life of a child who has to work 12-14 hours a day, seven days a week. After viewing images and reading stories of child laborers, class members select an image and write a richly detailed narrative about a typical...

Graphic organizers are a wonderful tool for young writers to use to help them get their thoughts in order for a piece of writing. Here, learners are coached on what a piece of narrative writing is, and how they must have a distinct...

A viewing of Disney’s 1993 film of The Adventures of Huck Finn launches an examination of the events in and themes of Mark Twain’s story. Viewers respond to prompts on a film story worksheet, engage in full-class discussions, and select...

Using Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, guide your class in the process of identifying unknown terms using context clues and formulating text-based answers. The lesson plan includes a useful worksheet incorporating scaffolding questions on an...

Students review and revise their writing from a portfolio created during a thematic unit. In this writing instructional activity, students working in pairs examine and revise written pieces using action verbs. They add at least 10 action...

Students practice their persuasive writing skills. In this writing process lesson, students write essays that meet the requirements of the included text element worksheets and analyze poetry of their choosing.

Working together, learners analyze a text looking for examples of good writing. While this lesson is just a framework for a more complete exploration, it provides a new way for learners to approach a text.

What would a three-dimensional representation of Bloom's revised taxonomy of the cognitive domain look like? Get a glimpse of the complex classification system that is frequently referenced in education to distinguish levels of...

Ninth graders synthesize their inquiry paths, research process, and claim formulation with a writing assessment at the end of the unit. Learners write a one-page perspective about their conclusions from the research process and outcomes...