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Organizer
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Polk Bros Foundation

Common Core Constructed Response Organizer

For Teachers 6th - 10th Standards
Get your writers ready to compose a constructed response essay in response to either an informational or fictional text. Pupils note down the big idea they wish to address as well as up to nine examples from the text that they wish to...
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Lesson Plan
2
2
What So Proudly We Hail

The Meaning of America: National Identity and Why It Matters

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Combining a close reading of a classic American text with the study of history can be a very powerful strategy, and this is most certainly the case with this resource using Edward Everett Hale's The Man without a Country. Consider themes...
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Lesson Plan
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National Endowment for the Humanities

Mark Twain and American Humor

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
“The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” is famous, in part, because it established a uniquely American form of humor. For this famous story, Mark Twain combines the tall-tale, the dialect story, and satire. Here is a resource...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Poetry Archive

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Listening to poems about feeling lonely and feeling like an outsider set the stage for a group activity that focuses on Stevie Smith's "Not Waving But Drowning." Groups examine the three stanzas of Smith's poem separately and identify in...
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Unit Plan
Random House

Teacher's Guide: The Hobbit: The Enchanting Prelude to Lord of the Rings

For Teachers 6th - 9th Standards
The Odyssey, Star Wars, The Hunger Games. Odysseus, Luke Skywalker, Katniss Everdeen. Add The Hobbit and Bilbo Baggins to these lists, and you have a unit examining classic and contemporary myths, legends, and folktales with hero and...
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Lesson Plan
What So Proudly We Hail

The Meaning of America: Freedom and Religion

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
The United States of America was founded on firm ideals of both the pursuit of happiness and a spirit of reverence. Through a close reading of Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The May-Pole of Merry Mount," you can examine what some consider was a...
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Lesson Plan
What So Proudly We Hail

The Meaning of America: Equality

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
What if society sought equality by handicapping the gifted and dispelling any traces of diversity? Kurt Vonnegut Jr. offers one possible answer to this question through his incredibly engaging and thought-provoking satirical...
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Activity
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Shmoop

ELA.CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RL.9-10.2

For Teachers 9th - 10th Standards
Identifying the theme or central idea of a text is a skill many young readers struggle with. It is also the second standard for reading literature in the Common Core. This resource, one from a series of Common Core lessons, can provide...
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Lesson Plan
Japan Society

Akutagawa Ryunosuke and the Taisho Modernists

For Teachers 9th - Higher Ed Standards
Japan's Taisho Period was a time when authors like Akutagawa and other Japanese modernists began to experiment with point of view and literary form, making the literature produced during this time period a natural choice for teaching...
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Lesson Plan
2
2
Japan Society

Changing Times, Changing Styles: New Japanese Literary Styles of the Late Nineteenth Century

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Focusing on Doppo's "Unforgettable People" and late nineteenth century Japanese literature, this resource also leads to discussions of form being dictated by content. Explore the development of new literary styles first-hand by...
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Lesson Plan
2
2
Pulitzer Center

"Voices from Haiti": Using Poetry to Speak up for a Cause

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Explore a real world use of poetry with your class! Young language arts pupils consider the concept of advocacy and how journalism, photography, and poetry can raise awareness for a cause. They read several poems about individuals...
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Worksheet
Curated OER

Setting Details in Of Mice and Men

For Students 7th - 9th Standards
After completing John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, groups are assigned a chapter to reread. Members list major conflicts and events and quote setting details. They then make observations about how the setting prepares the reader for the...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Exploring Contrasts in "The Lanyard" by Billy Collins

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Middle schoolers analyze the speaker's ideas and tone in the Billy Collins poem "The Lanyard." After identifying how each of the five senses is addressed in the poem, they compare images to draw conclusions about the speaker and his...
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Lesson Plan
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Curated OER

Flying Freudian Fun: A Look At Ethical Decision Making

For Teachers 9th Standards
There are not many more apt examples of ethics gone awry than William Golding's Lord of the Flies.. Ninth graders focus the ethics of decision making with the examples provided in the plot. They focus on the concept of the psyche and how...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Red Badge of Courage: A New Kind of Realism

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Is it possible to tell a true war story? Tim O’Brien says that fiction is for “getting at the truth when the truth isn’t sufficient for the truth.” To get at the truth about war, class members examine primary source materials from the...
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Lesson Plan
Penguin Books

An Educator’s Guide to Gayle Forman

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Sometimes a novel is the best way to tackle a tough topic. A helpful educator's guide for the novels of Gayle Forman discuss tough topics such as teenage suicide. Discussion questions and writing activities encourage readers to think...
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Activity
National Park Service

Petrified Forest National Park

For Teachers 6th - 9th Standards
Poetry Soup, a reading and writing unit constructed by the Petrified Forest National Park, will have scholars hungry to learn about nature. The cross-content unit contains topics related to history, science, and language arts. Content...
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Lesson Plan
2
2
Maryland Department of Education

The Concept of Diversity in World Literature Lesson 6: Culture Clash

For Teachers 10th - 11th Standards
To prepare for a Quickwrite on the question, "How do different points of view create cultural conflicts?" class groups draw examples of religious, cultural, and political conflicts from Things Fall Apart and The Poisonwood Bible to use...
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Lesson Plan
Novelinks

Count of Monte Cristo: Professor Know‐It‐All

For Teachers 6th - 10th Standards
Kids love to be the experts! With four themes from The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas, small groups work together to answer specific questions addressing each theme. They then stand in front of the class and field questions...
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Lesson Plan
Novelinks

Count of Monte Cristo: Concept/Vocabulary Analysis

For Teachers 6th - 10th Standards
Explore the complex themes of Alexandre Dumas' The Count of Monte Cristo with a concept and vocabulary analysis lesson plan. Lead your class in a discussion about the underlying social and historical issues surrounding the novel, as well...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Pearl: Problematic Situation

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Is money the root of all evil, or the answer to everyone's dreams? Analyze the role of money in John Steinbeck's The Pearl with a writing prompt where kids imagine that they have won the lottery, and must think about the ways it will...
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Lesson Plan
Novelinks

The Crucible: Questioning Strategies Bloom's Taxonomy

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Enrich your unit on Arthur Miller's The Crucible with a list of reading questions based on Bloom's Taxonomy. Kids answer questions and provide context for the knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation...
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Lesson Plan
Novelinks

Lord of the Flies: Themes and Notetaking

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
William Golding's Lord of the Flies is a treasure trove of symbolism and literary themes. Help your kids note the richest passages in the book with a lesson and graphic organizer. The lesson prepares kids to come up with a thesis...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Pride and Prejudice: Directed Reading Thinking Activity

For Teachers 7th - 10th Standards
Can you judge a book by its cover? Decide who and what Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice is about with a prediction activity. Before reading the first three chapters of the book, kids answer questions based on their interpretation of the...