"I want to be the president who educated young people to the wonders of their world." Readers examine the vision Lyndon B. Johnson presented for his presidency in this excerpt from his "The American promise" message delivered to Congress...

Build your library of strategies and activities for teaching phonemic awareness with the ideas provided in this resource. Described here are five different activities to try out with your class.

Is everyone treated fairly in America? The culminating fifth lesson from a series of five has pupils explore racial inequalities from the 1960s and decide whether or not society has changed over time. The lesson comes with a speech from...

Young orators demonstrate what they have learned about persuasion and persuasive devices throughout the unit by analyzing a persuasive speech and then crafting their persuasive essays. Class members engage in a role-play exercise, use...

There are advantages and disadvantages to all sources of energy; the trick is determining which one has the least impact! Part six in the series of 12 has learners further explore energy resources. After reading information about one of...

Would you stand up for your beliefs, no matter the cost? Scholars investigate their own families to uncover examples of how and when someone stood up for their ideals. Using video clips, interviews, and eulogies, they come to understand...

Use Nathanial Hawthorne's immortal text on the influence of religion on the early American settlements, as well as its continued impact on American culture, with a unit that focuses on The Scarlet Letter. In addition to Hawthorne's...

Speaking of the Internet. The culminating lesson for the unit on the Internet challenges pupils to prepare short, two-minute speeches on an issue facing society. The pupils chose from three topics that connect the Internet and...

Amanda Gorman, the United States's first National Youth Poet Laureate, is featured in a resource from the Academy of American Poets. Class members first read Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have A Dream" speech and note what King wanted...

Combine a lesson on the elderly with grammar instruction. Before viewing a series of provided video clips, class members brainstorm a list of words related to senior citizens and organize these words into categories that correspond with...

Ask not what the lesson here can do for you, but what you can do with the lesson. The answer is quite a lot! Young scholars revisit JFK's famous inaugural address with a focus on his plea for civic engagement. There's a...

Help your child hone his/her verbal communication skills and basic understanding of sentence structure with an app that promotes descriptive verbal interactions. The child is presented with an image, prompted to make a sentence, and then...

Provide parents with the tools they need to bridge the summer learning gap with this collection of fun activities. Whether it's creating an alphabet poster with illustrations for each letter, playing a game of sight word concentration,...

Today, Cuba and America sometimes struggle with diplomatic relations, but did you know that America went to war against Spain to free Cuba? Learners examine many interesting facts related to the Spanish American War using an informative...

Honor Abe Lincoln with a set of activity-based worksheets that can be used independently and in collaborative groups. Young historians participate in a listening activity where they fill in the missing blanks in a passage while being...

Invite your young historians to consider how the first president of the United States envisioned the future of the new nation with this primary source analysis worksheet on George Washington's Farewell Address.

A key challenge in teaching kids how to read informational text, particularly primary source documents, is finding suitable resources and then developing questions that guide readers. Never fear, help is here in the form of a series...

Much has been made of the differences between Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X. But was there any common ground between them? Class members reconsider what they think they know about these two civil rights leaders with...

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "Letter from Birmingham Jail" serves as an exemplar for a mini-lesson on semicolons. Working alone or in small groups, class members first circle all the semicolons in the letter, and then consider how this...

Having a hard time defining bullying with your seventh graders? Discuss the different types of behavior one would see in a bullying situation with a series of lessons, worksheets, and group activities.

Sit-ins and boycotts, marches and speeches, songs and demonstrations were hallmarks of nonviolent protest of the civil rights movement. Young scholars research primary and secondary source documents to determine what made nonviolent...

Assess reading fluency with a variety of reading passages. Each passage is a few paragraphs long and focuses on a particular topic. A couple of comprehension questions are paired with each passage.

Keep track of your learners' mastered sight words with 11 sets of words. Four columns list the words, as well as three columns for you to mark the date of mastery. 

Should Turkey be admitted to the European Union? Before debating this question, class members research the background and stated purpose of the EU, read articles of Turkey's bid to become a member of the EU, and the concerns other...