Defining success: A debate about success encourages critical thinking skills

This learning experience fosters awareness of representations we see, and don't see, in the media. Learners list TV programs, games, and films they enjoy, identify characters' ethnic, religious, (dis)ability, and sexual orientation...

Split the class into two groups for a fishbowl discussion using of Jerry Spinelli's Maniac Magee. The first group initiates the conversation by reviewing the important points of Chapter thirteen while group two members are listening,...

George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, published in 1949, can seem strangely prophetic when compared to modern news events and politics. Readers of Orwell's dystopian classic sharpen their critical thinking skills by engaging in a shared...

Challenge your class to hold a discussion about the theme of death in Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead without direct teacher guidance. After going over the discussion protocols and quotes from the text, learners move in a circle...

Develop the techniques needed to analyze and synthesize literature well. No matter what students read, they need to be able to think critically about the material. Give thinkers these tools to effectively ponder and consider the world...

Explore the fables of today along with Aesop's ancient fables. Learners will understand the structure of a fable, critically think about the fable's message, and create a lesson plan that they would like to teach through a fable....

What skills are necessary to interact with different types of text? Twenty-first century learners live in a digital world and must develop a whole new set of skills to develop media literacy. Class members engage in a series of...

Develop critical thinkers and awareness of the media's techniques. Impressionable minds analyze advertisements they see all around them in this potentially 3-week long unit of five complete lesson plans. Extended discussions, outside...

Kids age 13 and older are asked to read the provided Times article and background information in order to construct a thoughtful blog response to Obama's first Oval Office speech. They work to address each of the related critical...

The ambiguity in Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre makes the novel a perfect choice for a shared inquiry discussion. Readers respond to open-ended questions with evidence drawn directly from the text.