Shirley Jackson's short story "The Lottery" provides middle schoolers with an opportunity to hone their close reading and literary analysis skills. After annotating their copy of the story, writer's craft an essay in which they analyze...

[Free Registration/Login Required] This is a film guide for the film West Side Story (1961), the musical adaptation of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, which is set in 1950s New York and incorporates themes around street crime,...

Students will be answering text-dependent questions in which they will have to describe the differences between the different characters, settings, and major events in our stories using complex contrasting sentences. The students will...

Teachers will learn how to use story writing frames with their students. Teachers will learn how to implement story frames; measure progress with story frames; and find research to support using story frames. A reproducible story frame...

This unit from the Yale University on elements of the short story is designed to develop student comprehension skills, particularly making inferences and generalizing. It also involves students in reading a number of short stories to...

In this lesson plan, young scholars will engage in the technology, social studies, and language arts standards as students engage in reading by Octavia Butler's book entitled Kindred. Young scholars will research tslavery. Students will...

Lesson for early elementary and special education students utlizing the book Miss Moo Goes to the Zoo by Kelly Graves and graphic organizers to identify elements in a story (title, author, setting, characters, etc.). Students participate...

Enemy Pie by Derek Munson makes readers think seriously about this question: "What if I had to spend an entire day with someone with whom I had a conflict?" This question presents young writers with a great launching pad for developing...

Explore characterization, plot and setting and compare these elements in mythology and modern works of literature, film and television. Retell myths in modern settings or modern-day stories using a mythological Greek setting. While this...