Consume, gobble, devour ... serving up strong verbs! Writers focus on using dialogue, strong action verbs, and sensory details in their writing. After analyzing a model narrative, they apply their learning to their own hero's journey...

Spice up your writing! Your amateur writers will benefit from concentrating on understanding and improving verb use in writing. An introductory activity addresses weak verbs. A second exercise helps them see the importance of strong...

Eighth graders explore how to incorporate vivid verbs in their writing. They review action verbs in sentences and view a Power Point presentation discussing possible verbs and their meanings. They view a website and retell a Greek myth...

Scholars take part in two exercises to boost their knowledge of personification. After reading a detailed description and excerpts from famous poems, writers list action verbs and objects then combine words to create a humorous...

Young scholars find vivid verbs in literature and use them in their own writing. In this vivid verbs lesson, students use a 'Thinking Thesaurus' of major verbs to study common verbs. Young scholars then practice rewriting sentences using...

Students remove to beverbs from their writing. In this verb usage lesson, students write strategies from eliminating to be verbs, then locate the verbs in their writing and eliminate as many as possible.

Students find vivid verbs in the story Thank You for the Thistle, by Doree Durston. They add vivid verbs to an existing story to make it more interesting.

Review the narrative writing process with your emerging story writers. They read a sample narrative and identify five vague verbs that could be replaced with a more exact, exciting verb. Then they write a personal narrative making sure...

Students explore verbs. They list and demonstrate verbs. Students discuss words that connote different meanings. They write paragraphs based on their word selection. Students share their paragraphs with the class.

Students write a descriptive paragraph. In this writing lesson, students define elaboration and discuss the characteristics of an elaborate paragraph. Students write a paragraph that contains vivid adjectives, strong verbs and exact nouns.

Students recognize the situations in which the use of the past continuous would be beneficial in writing. They focus on the use of the past continuous as a descriptive tense when something important occurred.

Students are provided an opportunity for self-expression. They collaborate with a partner and compose a list poem. Students practice reading and writing skills. They explore lists and catalogues--both elements of poetry and practical...

Help your class find their writing voices with this lesson which uses the work of Ralph Fletcher to guide a "Prompt in Reverse" activity. Using the chapter "First Pen" from Fletcher's Marshfield Dreams, learners decipher what they...

Students categorize studenT toys by intelligence types. They review toy safety and function and identify the appropriate play age of various toys. They read and evaluate studenT books and write one of their own.

Drama is ever-present in our daily lives and eloquently depicted on stage. Middle schoolers practice writing scenes based on different prompts and frameworks, and then perform those creative scenes for their classmates. The...

Direct your class’s attention to the elements that make their community unique. After examining sample travel brochures, groups select something from their community to use as the subject, and then research, create, and publish a...

Use a presentation on dialogue tags in a narrative writing unit or a literature lesson. The first two pages of the resource detail the information and examples in the following slide show, making it a good reference page for your...

Students, after watchin the story What Does This Show, summarize everyday life in ancient Egypt by writing about a typical day in the life of an Egyptian man or woman

Students create landscape flyers of local landscapes using digital photography, educational software, and examples of Irish landscapes. This creative-project instructional activity lasts two weeks, including class time spent collecting...

In this lesson plan, students will consider Vengeful Verbs in Shakespeare's Hamlet. Worksheets and other supporting materials can be found under the Resources tab. In this lesson plan, students will learn to distinguish generic verbs...

This instructional activity engages students in analyzing word choices. Students will write descriptive paragraphs about interesting magazine pictures and ensure that they are using vivid words in their writings.

In this 3-lesson unit, learners will read Douglass's narrative. They will analyze Douglass's vivid first-hand accounts of the lives of slaves and the behavior of slave owners to see how he successfully contrasts reality with romanticism...