How can adding a prefix or suffix to a root word create an entirely new word? Study a packet of resources that focuses on Greek and Latin roots, as well as different prefixes and suffixes that learners can use for easy reference

Support your instruction of The Cay by Theodore Taylor with this extensive unit of materials. Provided here are prereading activities, worksheets and discussion questions for the entire book, and reading quizzes that you can use to check...

Have you ever wondered how to create a successful word wall? The first two pages of this document highlight the positive benefits for having a word wall. There's also a section that presents the word wall routine which presents how and...

If your writing classroom was the Wild West, what phrases would be "outlawed"? Here is one poster that every writing instructor, and really, any teacher of communication, should have in their classroom!

How figurative language effects the tone and meaning in Chapter Three of Christopher Paul Curtis' Bud, Not Buddy is the focus of a series of exercises that ask readers to locate record, and analyze Curtis' word choices.

Lois Lowry's The Giver is one of the most engaging and thought-provoking works of literature in the middle school curriculum. Round out your novel unit with a collection of reading activities, comprehension questions, memoir and journal...

What's the best resource to use when looking up words? Use Visual Thesaurus to see a word's meaning. The class accesses the interactive website and then compares and contrasts the difference between using a traditional dictionary and the...

Use the Visual Thesaurus to predict the subject matter of Rick Riordan's book The Lightning Thief. A pre-reading activity encourages middle schoolers to use context clues and word meaning to discover what the book is about. After they...

Therefore! However! Furthermore! Explore the power of transition words and phrases. Signal your readers by suggesting the relationship between different thoughts or points. Help them demonstrate an understanding of word relationships. 

Signal words are one way that authors make the relationships between their ideas clear. Allow your learners the chance to investigate cause and effect in texts by identifying signal words. They locate and analyze cause-and-effect...