Gospel Beginnings - Lesson 1

Where does a writer find inspiration? "Go into yourself," or so says Rainer Maria Rilke in "Letter One" from Letters to a Young Poet. Readers of Rilke's letter to Franz Xaver Kappus look at the words and figurative language Rilke uses to...

Class members begin their study of Romeo and Juliet by examining the words Shakespeare chooses in the Prologue to Act I to create the tragic tone of his famous play about the star-crossed lovers.

Clear up the misconceptions about autism and individuals on the autism spectrum with an inquiry-based lesson. As ninth graders read the first four pages of Temple Grandin's Animals in Translation: Using the Mysteries of Autism to Decode...

Explore the religious symbolism in A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest J. Gaines. Once your class has read through Chapter 21, lead them in a discussion about the way religious symbols make their way through the novel, and their impact on...

The opening exercise in this instructional unit introduces class members to the writing process they will follow to craft an informative, expository research paper that addresses their research question. To begin, writers are asked to...

Once conceived, a guided set of literary analysis lessons will assist you day and night. Ninth graders take a close look at "The Tell-Tale Heart" and analyze how Poe uses point of view to create questions about the narrator's sanity and...

After watching the scene from Romeo + Juliet in which Juliet argues with her parents because she does not want to marry Paris, groups do a close reading of act 4, scene 1, lines 44-88, examining the word choices in the conversation...

Use a discussion on themes of A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest J. Gaines to inspire your class's writing. After addressing the themes of racism, commitment, and manhood, kids use historical references and evidence from the text to answer...

As part of a study of narrative writing, class members analyze how Leslie Marmon Silko structures the beginning, and orients and engages readers in her narrative, "Yellow Woman and a Beauty of the Spirit."

Scholars discuss the concept of a barrier with a short passage on Jackie Robinson. The writing process begins with a paragraph and several other sentences about Robinson's unique traits that made breaking a barrier possible.