Who are we and what shapes our identities? Seventh graders work to answer this question as they learn how to write a memoir. Full of non-print resources and supplemental texts that range from fiction to non-fiction, scholars write their...

They Call Me Güero: A Border Kid's Poems by David Bowles is the focus of a five-week language arts unit unit. Fifth graders listen to various poems and participate in thoughtful discussions, examining vocabulary and learning new words in...

Writing is a process, and lesson planning is, too! A personal narrative unit stresses the writing process to pupils, who first examine various stories and poems as a model of autobiographical writing and then write their own stories....

Focus on poetry this summer to enhance those comprehension, fluency, and language skills with a set of resources intended to explore different types of poetry, specifically lyric poetry. The daily activities contain differentiation ideas...

The Odyssey is the core text in this unit study of the hero's journey motif. Along the way, kids research Greek and Roman history, mythology, art, and epic poetry. The 104-page packet is perfect for homeschool or classroom situations and...

Who am I? Pupils work to answer this question through a unit that explores personal narratives and identity. Exit tickets for activities that examine different poems, short stories, and autobiographical writing serve as prewriting for...

Should primary graders have their own computers? Should animals be kept in captivity? Young writers learn how to develop and support a claim in this short unit on persuasive writing.

Scholars learn all about the Puritans in the third installment of a 16-part lesson series. After watching a video, they read and discuss biographies of Puritans and Quakers from American history, write journal entries and poetry, and...

The Navajo people build their dwellings with the doors facing the rising sun in the east to welcome wealth and fortune. Pupils learn about the traditions of the Navajo people in the first part of a 16-part unit. They explore American...

To prepare for crafting their own memoir, class members examine poetry by Margaret Atwood, Billy Collins, Robert Hayden, and Claude McKay, stories by Richard Rodriquez and Willa Cather, and Barry Levinson's film Avalon. They examine...

The poems of Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson are the focus of a unit that asks readers to consider how an artist's life and changes in society influences his or her work. After careful study of Whitman's and Dickinson's perspectives on...

How do poets convey emotion and represent their views of life? Pupils learn more about Whitman and Dickinson through the unit and analyze their bold reinvention of craft and style for poets to come. Looking at classic pieces such as...

Zora Neal Hurston, Toni Morrison, and Maya Angelou are featured in a guided inquiry unit. High schoolers research the lives and works of these and other Black women writers and craft an argument, using evidence from their research, to...

How did literature reflect people's attitudes in post-World War I America? A lesson explores the topic using a variety of activities. Individuals watch and respond to a video; read author biographies and engage in discussion; write...

What motivated Europeans to explore the New World, and what effects did their exploration have on Native American populations? The second installment of a 16-part American Passages series prompts pupils to watch a video and read several...

What were the virtues and values that helped form America? Pupils watch and discuss a video, read biographies of early Americans, chart the differences between early American religious movements, write journals and letters, draw, and...

Students participate in a lesson that covers the genre of narrative poetry. They examine the elements of a narrative poem while focusing upon the characterization. Students compare and contrast the characters while analyzing their...

Students improve their creative writing skills. In this writing skills lesson, students learn about picture captions, story writing, critiques, poems, reports, letter writing, creative writing, and a rap poem.

Students analyze the writing process through the ten lessons of this unit. The expository lessons address topic and detail sentences, paragraph organization and development, note taking, reports and letter writing.

Students engage in a study about the life of young girl in the book "Bums In The Attic". They read the narrative story while considering the first person point of view. Students write a journal that analyzes the author's style of writing.

Terror, mystery, excitement. American writers of the 19th century, including Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, and Emily Dickinson, used these elements to create morally ambiguous tales that challenged the prevailing belief in...

Students survey several concepts in literature, science, history, and geography as a preparation for the CSAP standardized testing experience. This nine lesson unit provides exposure to the format and content of the test.

Students read and compare excerpts from The Odyssey and The Adventures of Telemachus to create their own story based on a secondary character. In this literary analysis   lesson, students read and compare the excerpts from the...

Students practice biographical and autobiographical forms of writing: autobiography, biopoem, character traits, classmate biography.