It's important that writers leave their readers with a strong and satisfying conclusion. Help your young writers develop the skills to compose a concluding sentence with the steps outlined here. After class members have had a chance to...

Encourage your young writers to thoughtfully plan and organize their work. First, model how this is done and vocalize your thought process as you work. Next, create a class list of strategies that they can use during independent writing...

Ready, set, write! Scholars work on the end-of-unit assessment by completing a writing prompt. They then look at the model performance task from instructional activity two to create a rubric for scoring the exercise. Using turn and talk,...

Looking for a performance assessment that asks individuals to demonstrate their competency in writing about informational text? Use Frederick Douglass' essay "On the Dred Scott Decision," and an excerpt from Abraham Lincoln's 1857 speech...

Support vocabulary instruction for any unit with this quick exercise. Class members write down the word, part of speech, and definition. They compose an original sentence using the word, and draw a picture of the word. Four words fit on...

Scholars analyze a model Readers Theater script. Then, small groups read their scripts aloud to help determine where they need to make revisions.

Identify examples of strong voice in popular picture books. Young authors add voice to their writing and revise their own writing. In addition, they share their writing with their peers.

Here is an inventive, and easy-to-implement lesson on the writing of topic sentences. Learners review what a topic sentence is, practice identifying topic sentences in an informational article, then play a really cool game. All of the...

Poetry is a very personal and introspective art form. Give your class the opportunity to understand how a poet's voice can speak to them on a personal level, and that every reader can respond to an author differently. After a poetic...

Promote collaboration in the classroom with a historical fiction instructional activity. Fourth graders partner up and read the other's narrative to give feedback on vocabulary choice and the accuracy of historical information. After...

Are American young people prepared to become tomorrow's leaders in technological innovation, or does an obsession with being cool sidetrack essential skills? That is the question freshmen and sophomores must address in a performance...

High schoolers investigate the dilemma of a proportional response with a lesson about the history of terrorism and militant extremists in the United States. As they examine memos from the FBI and speeches from President Bush and Obama,...

Happy birthday! Celebrate everyone's birthday with this writing activity, which prompts seventh graders to research historical events in a country at the time of their birth to create an essay. Working in pairs, they proofread each...

Middle schoolers discuss the meaning of the sentence, The student asked to go to the office." Ask the class if the sentence gives the reader any information about the student. Can they visualize the way the student asked the question?...

Students study examples of each trait in literature. They discuss how each trait adds to the craft of writing and practice revision of a writing piece with a particular trait in focus. They rate their writing on the trait of Ideas using...

Use a quick bell-ringer to interest your class in the art of persuasion. They brainstorm where they find examples of persuasion in their lives and identify who is trying to persuade them. Then they either fish through magazines or look...

Choose a side! Pupils watch and read several nonfiction resources about zoos. After gathering their research, they choose a side either for or against closing zoos. Scholars complete KWL charts, anticipation guides, flow charts, and...

Should schools continue to teach cursive writing? After reading and considering the merits of a series of arguments on both sides of this proposition, class members choose a side of the issue and craft their own argument, drawing support...

Your pupils are poets, and now they'll be able to show it with the exercises in this packet. The lessons, designed for beginner, intermediate, and experienced poets, not only feature a variety of poetic forms, but take...

Help your young writers recognize the importance of composing formal letters. Middle schoolers read letters written by Thomas Jefferson and analyze the components that make it a formal letter.  They will then compose their own...

A lesson begins with a discussion on gratitude—what does it mean, and for who are learners thankful? Scholars share their thoughts and feelings then choose a community worker to which they wish to share their gratitude. Writers compose a...

Explore the characters in My Antonia by Willa Cather with a biopoem assignment. Pupils use the provided format to write their poems about any character from the book.

Scholars scour thematically aligned texts to gather a bank of words they can use in an original acrostic poem. 

What's got 60 eyes, 150 fingers, and an endless number of ideas? Your language arts class! Challenge young writers to come up with clever riddles with an online poetry lesson.