Challenge writers to compose an essay detailing their stance on, and the history of, voting. Three assignments, each broken down into three parts, requires fifth graders to take notes, read and complete charts, write paragraphs, compare...

A three-part assessment promotes reading comprehension skills. Class members read literary texts and take notes to discuss their findings, answer comprehension questions, write summaries, and complete charts. 

Scholars read excerpts from the story, Heidi, in a three-part assessment that focuses on comparing and contrasting characters. Each part contains three tasks that challenge learners to discuss, answer comprehension...

William Shakespeare: a writer, a poet, a fake? For their mid-unit assessments, scholars read an excerpt from the article "The Top Ten Reasons Shakespeare Did Not Write Shakespeare" by Keir Cutler. Next, they analyze the author's argument...

The last instructional activity in this unit about human rights consists of a final assessment. To demonstrate the skills your class has acquired throughout this unit, they will work with a new article entitled "From Kosovo to the United...

The best sandwiches aren't always edible. Pupils use a Quote Sandwich graphic organizer to plan paragraphs two and three of their position papers about the best food chain. Next, they begin drafting their body paragraphs for the mid-unit...

Time to revise! Scholars revise their argument essays based on Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream using feedback from their teacher and peers. They begin their revisions after reviewing a mini-lesson on proper writing conventions.

As teachers, it is our job to encourage learners to stand up for what they believe in and help them learn lessons from life's events. A set of practice questions designed for the ELA MCAS assessment features passages that teach positive...

Positive feedback is a great way to improve writers' skills. Scholars receive their draft essays back with teacher comments and start the revision process. Next, they prepare to begin their final drafts at home.

Show class members how to connect algebra to geometry. A high school assessment task has pupils determine volumes of two different containers given limitations on material for box frames. Pupils then write a paragraph on...

Challenge algebra learners to use the difference of cubes to solve this problem. Once your charges have taken out the factor (a - b), combined the like terms and set them equal to zero, the problem becomes a factorable quadratic...

Scholars read an excerpt from the short story "The Bonfire" by Kunikida Doppo as well as a nonfiction passage about handcycling. Next, they answer comprehension-based multiple-choice questions. Additionally, they respond to short-answer...

Should companies track consumers' shopping preferences without their permission? Using the resource, scholars write source-based argumentative essays to answer the question. They also answer reading comprehension questions based on an...

Close the unit on Esperanza Rising with an in-class analytic essay on how Esperanza changes over the course of the novel. Writers can use any of their notes and work from the unit as well as their drafts of the first two paragraphs of...

After rereading the full text of Walter Mosley's essay "True Crime," groups complete an evidence collection tool worksheet, and then class members independently draft a multi-paragraph, evidence-based response that identifies how Mosley...

Make a game out of solving equations. This particular activity works well for pairs of learners. Follow the instructions to have player one pick a number and player two verbally give an equation. Participants need to make sense of a...

This PDF lesson, POWER PARAGRAPH, focuses on analysis and will also help students to understand structure in a paragraph. The "power" concept teaches the students to organize their sentences according to different levels of importance....

Tips for tackling the questions on the SAT Writing and Language Test that ask you to improve the order of sentences in a paragraph or paragraphs in a passage.

This preposition practice activity provides a paragraph from a Hemingway short story. Students click on all of the prepositions used in prepositional phrases in the story. These words will appear in a box below. When finished they can...

This is a PDF of a persuasive writing assignment for the short story "Lamb to the Slaughter" by Roald Dahl. It asks the students to watch a linked video clip of the closing argument by Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird and apply...

In this interactive grammar quiz, students are asked to read a paragraph and insert the correct punctuation, capitalization, and corrected spellings. When finished, they click on "Grammar's Version" for the corrected paragraph with...

An interactive exercise consisting of a paragraph with forty uses of compound nouns and modifiers. Students decide if each compound is written correctly or incorrectly.

This site provides a list of reminders about paraphrases. Then student will self-assess their own writings to ensure that they have properly used their paraphrases.

"Settlement with Multiple Choice Questions" is a one page, nonfiction, reading passage about the hardships of life of the prairie for the early settlers. It is followed by questions which require students to provide evidence from the...