Students read a variety of electronic Aesop's fables to define fable and moral, and write and illustrate an original fable. They then publish their fable using PowerPoint.

Conduct a written literary discussion and diminish stress about public writing. Class members, already arranged into literature circles, compose and post responses to novels, signing with initials or class number. The process continues...

Here is a fun resource that your kids will love. While reading the book Because of Winn-Dixie, they analyze the story's main characters by creating an online scrapbook. The purpose is to have them identify character traits and use...

Develop a better understanding of "Blackbeard's Ghost" with this differentiated instructional activity. Working in groups on a creative project, middle schoolers can reinforce their reading comprehension and literary analysis...

Explore the concept of retelling a story with the Gingerbread Man. Read various gingerbread man stories with your class. They will create character puppets and retell the story to one another and in small groups. Additionally, they will...

Examine letters written during war-time. For this cross curricular history and English lesson, middle and high school scholars read letters and poems written by soldiers in the Vietnam war. They will examine the perspective and emotions...

Youngsters review nouns, adjectives and verbs. In this poetry lesson, readers choose a set of antonyms and create a list of synonyms, verbs and adjective for each. Young scholars use the words to write a Diamante poem.

Pupils determine the meaning of tier-two vocabulary words. They explore vocabulary while reading Amigo. As they read, they record their words in a word journal or on a discovery chart. The words bold, content, pleasant, seek, wise, and...

Read Pink and Say and discuss the Civil War with your upper elementary learners. They create a KWL about the Civil War and record words relating to the Civil War as they read the book. Then they work in groups to create an ABC...

Show your scholars how adding an affix changes the entire meaning of a word; they focus on the suffix -able. You'll find a complete script here, but if you don't want to read this verbatim, use it simply as an outline. Learners...

Help readers develop awareness of comprehension issues and employ tools for better understanding. The best way to begin this strategy is to model it through a think aloud. Choose a book scholars will also be reading, preferably one they...

Amigo by Byrd Baylor gives learners a chance to practice with unknown words and context clues. Choose several vocabulary words to focus on as you read the picture book, or use the ones provided here (the book is in English...

Suggested to accompany a class reading of The Great Gatsby, this plan begins with a discussion emphasizing the reputation of Vanderbilt University. Then, after the class has a working knowledge of the wealth associated with the school,...

Whether new to the KWHL strategy or not readers of Briar Rose will benefit from the detailed procedures and templates designed for Jane Yolen’s novel. Links are provided for research into the Holocaust and activities reveal the many...

All things considered, it will be a good day for readers as they manage on their own to develop questions about what intrigues, bothers, or confuses them in Laurie Halse Anderson's tale of Mattie Cook and the Yellow Fever epidemic...

Determine if the graphic novel Maus, by Art Spiegelman, is an appropriate reading level for your class by performing this cloze activity. Kids read the passage and attempt to complete the sentences on a second or third read through. All...

Although labeled an anticipation guide, this plan is designed to be used about 22 pages into Speak, by Laurie Halse Anderson. A guide is provided with 10 statements. As they read each one, they mark whether or not they agree and whether...

Readers of Twelfth Night use a KWHL chart to record information about what they know about Shakespeare's play, what they want to find out, how they plan on finding this information, and what they have learned or still want to learn about...

To celebrate National Poetry Month, young writers focus on the role letter writing has played in the development of poets. They begin by journaling three to five associations to a writing prompt that requires them to identify their...

"Who says a pen has to be called a pen? Why not call it a frindle?" Inspired by this quote from the award-winning novel written by Andrew Celements, this lesson allows children to invent their own...

Using adjectives to create vivid descriptions is the focus of exercises in this resource. A cloze reading activity asks class members to add missing adjectives to passages from Mark Teague's The Lost and Found. They then read...

This pre-reading activity will certainly make your class ponder. With five questions to reflect upon, get insight to the moral dilemma Percy faced in the novel Percy Jackson and the Olympians, The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan. 

A K-W-H-L chart is a great way to scaffold prior knowledge. As class members begin their reading of Out of the Dust, Karen Hesse’s 1998 Newbery Medal winning verse novel, they chart what they already know about the Great Depression...

How important are sound effects in films? In stage plays? In radio programs? To gain an understanding of the impact of these special effects, class members watch a short video spoof of the sound in a scene from Star...