Thirty-six pages familiarize scholars with the story and vocabulary of A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. After reading and listening to an abbreviated version of the holiday tale learners show what they know about the sequence of...

Is identity defined by genes, cultural standards, personal feelings, a combination of these, or something else altogether? Scholars learn about the complex topic of identity with a presentation, a game, and with a series of discussions....

Why did the orchestra director use a copper baton? She heard it makes a great conductor. Scholars select six items to test in a circuit to determine if each is a conductor or an insulator. Clear instructions for using electricity allow...

Young scientists design a rocket to launch using Newton's Laws of Motion in order to discover for themselves the forces of motion. 

Jacque's soliloquy from Act II, scene ii of As You Like It sets the stage for a close reading exercise that models how to approach difficult, dense text and enables readers to practice reading comprehension and analysis skills. Learners...

Learn about the destruction of the rainforest by analyzing statistics. Young learners make an original line graph showing destruction in the rainforest. Additional activities include making a collage, sequencing Dr. Seuss' The Lorax,...

The tenth lesson in the 12-part poetry unit asks seventh graders to reflect on their learning about poetry and share their work with other poets.

Ouch! The final lesson in the 12-resource poetry unit models for young writers how poems can be used to voice hard truths.

The 11th resource in a 12-part poetry unit is a bonus instructional activity comprised of poems, activities, and resources that review the essential concepts of the unit.

Young balladeers analyze examples of ballads and generate a list of common traits (story, quatrains, rhyme schemes, refrains, etc.), then identify these traits in Robert W. Service's "The Cremation of Sam McGee" and a ballad written by...

Concrete poems, or shape poems as they are sometimes called, are the focus of the eighth lesson in this poetry unit. Young scholars examine several examples of concrete poems and consider how the shape contributes to the poem's meaning.

Spongebob Squarepants helps teach middle schoolers about personification! After discussing the human characteristics demonstrated by the cartoon character, scholars identify the personification in poems by Emily Dickinson and Langston...

Introduce middle schoolers to poetic devices with a lesson that asks them to find examples of alliteration, anaphora, onomatopoeia, metaphors, similes, and personification in various poems. Young scholars craft examples of these poetic...

Young scholars learn how to distinguish between the mood of a piece of writing (how the work makes the reader feel) and the tone (the writer's attitude toward the material) in the sixth lesson in a poetry unit. After watching two very...

A study of Rudyard Kipling's poem, "If," launches a lesson about theme. Class members read Kipling's poem and poems by other seventh graders to identify the themes.

Young poets learn the value of using a thesaurus when crafting and revising poems. They examine poems rich in figurative language and then a revised version with the figurative language removed. To demonstrate what they have learned,...

Identifying the tone in a piece of writing can be tricky. Readers don't have the advantage of studying the images and colors used in a painting or the instruments and sounds of a song. The second instructional activity in this poetry...

The first lesson of 12 in a poetry unit asks class members to develop their own definition of poetry. After crafting a response, they examine a variety of examples and decide if the resources are or are not poems.

Traditions, like the times, are a-changin'. Middle schoolers conduct a close reading of Richard Blanco's poem "América" and consider how Blanco's family approached his suggestions for adopting a new approach to their Thanksgiving meal.

A paragraph from John Steinbeck's Travels with Charley provides English language learners with an opportunity to practice strategies for answering guiding questions about the academic text. Class members locate keywords in the annotated...

John Smith's 1616 letter to Queen Anne of England offers ELLs an opportunity to learn about a bit of early American history. The four-page packet includes the full text of the letter. In addition, the packet includes a worksheet that...

Joseph Bruchac's Code Talker tells the remarkable story of Navajo Marines' role in battles of the Pacific Theater during World War II. As scholars read the novel, they also engage in activities that expand their knowledge of Navajo...

Frequently banned, often challenged, a mainstay of middle school curriculum, Tales from the Secret Annex, is the featured text in the seventh unit in the Teacher Guide Core Knowledge Program. The 134-page guide includes an introduction,...

Introduce your seventh graders to the Harlem Renaissance with a unit that explores this dynamic period's music, literature, and ideas. The 160-page guide includes a unit calendar, an introduction to the unit, 10 richly detailed lessons...