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Lesson Plan
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Shakespeare Uncovered

Henry IV, Part I: Does Father Know Best?

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
“Yea, there thou mak’st me sad and mak’st me sin/In envy that my Lord Northumberland/Should be the father to so blest a son--.” Henry IV, Part I, provides the text for a series of exercises that ask class members to examine the...
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Lesson Plan
2
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Shakespeare Uncovered

All the Globe’s a Stage: Shakespeare’s Theatre

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
“All the world’s a stage,” exclaims Jaques in As You Like It, but it is the structure of the Globe stage and how that structure influenced Shakespeare’s plays that is the focus of an on-line research project. Class members visit a series...
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Lesson Plan
2
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PBS

Does Art Imitate Life?

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Write what you know, sound advice for any writer and something many famous authors are known to have done. Use these materials to explore how Shakespeare's life influenced his plays. This resource is packed with readings, video segments,...
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Lesson Plan
Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights

Juliana Dogbadzi: Slavery/Trafficking

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Progress your learners' comprehension of universal human rights by exploring the violation of human trafficking through the experiences of Juliana Dogbadzi. This activity analyzes and discusses very sensistive and graphic issues but is...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Shakespearean Comedy on Film

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
This activity will focus on the aspects of Shakespeare's comedy that become more evident in performance. By viewing clips of the same Shakespeare scene in different film versions, high schoolers have the opportunity to engage in a close...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Poetry Shopping Spree

For Teachers 6th - 12th Standards
Scholars demonstrate the ability to evaluate authors' use of literary elements such as metaphor, simile, personification, imagery, and onomatopoeia. They are provided with a checklist and must shop for poems that contain the poetry terms...
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Interactive
Texas Education Agency (TEA)

Simile and Metaphor (English III Reading)

For Students 11th Standards
The key idea in this interactive exercise designed for high schoolers is that figurative language, especially similes, and metaphors, add layers of meaning to a text. Users examine examples from speeches, ads, movie dialogue, and poems,...
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Lesson Plan
K20 LEARN

Identity: Characterization/Character Traits

For Teachers 10th - 11th Standards
"Who am I?" Guy de Maupassant's short story "The Necklace," Julio Naboa Polanco's poem "Identity," and a clip from a Jason Bourne film provide learners with a context to consider the traits that makeup identity. Scholars create a...
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Lesson Plan
K20 LEARN

Preparing for Othello - Frontloading Meaning (Part 2): Pre-reading Strategies

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
The second lesson in a two-part series that prepares high schoolers for a study of Othello focuses on additional pre-reading strategies. Pupils reflect on what they have learned and consider what they would like to learn about the play....
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Lesson Plan
K20 LEARN

Locating Archetypes in Pop Culture, Literature, and Life

For Teachers 11th - 12th Standards
Archetypes help readers connect literature to the world around them. A lesson plan uses elements of pop culture to teach about archetypal traits of common characters  and discuss issues of perception and other literary devices. At the...
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Lesson Plan
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Common Sense Media

My Online Code

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Approach ethical online behavior with a series of activities geared toward teaching pupils about digital citizenship. After a brief discussion about ethics, small groups inspect a fictional social networking profile with ethics in mind....
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Unit Plan
Trinity University

Dante's Inferno: Allegory, Hero's Journey, or Epic Poem? Yes!

For Teachers 12th Standards
Dante Alighieri's "The Inferno" is the central text in a unit designed for high school seniors. Scholars compare the Christian concept of Hell to Dante's. In addition, they examine the tale as an example of epic poetry, as an allegory,...
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Lesson Plan
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California Department of Education

Call the Tune: Music in Literature

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
I am dancing to the music in my head. Scholars learn to listen for music in their heads as they read literature and poems. After they identify and analyze poetic devices that relate to music, they create their own musical poems.
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Lesson Plan
National Endowment for the Humanities

Toni Morrison's Beloved: For Sixty Million and More

For Teachers 11th - 12th Standards
Complex, disturbing, and challenging, Beloved is the focus of a lesson plan that provides three activities to guide a close reading of Toni Morrison's novel. Readers create chapter titles based on key plot elements or themes, identify...
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Lesson Plan
Academy of American Poets

Teach This Poem: "A New National Anthem" by Ada Limón

For Teachers 3rd - 12th Standards
Ada Limon's poem, "A New National Anthem," offers young scholars an opportunity to reflect on the significance of the US national anthem and the extent to which Key's vision applies to all Americans. After watching a video of Whitney...
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Lesson Plan
Academy of American Poets

Teach This Poem: “Making History” by Marilyn Nelson

For Teachers 3rd - 8th Standards
What makes an event newsworthy, worth a reference in a news magazine or textbook? Who decides? These are questions Marilyn Nelson asks readers of her poem "Making History" to consider. To begin, class members list details they notice in...
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Lesson Plan
Academy of American Poets

Teach This Poem: “Declaration” by Tracy K. Smith

For Teachers 6th - 12th Standards
Tracy K. Smith's erasure poem "Declaration" challenges scholars to use their noticing skills to make connections between an engraving entitled "The Declaration of Independence" and Smith's poem. Class members record observations and...
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Lesson Plan
Academy of American Poets

Teach This Poem: "A Place in the Country" by Toi Derricotte

For Teachers 6th - 12th Standards
Build young scholars' confidence in analyzing art and poetry with a instructional activity that first asks pupils to list details they notice in Edouard Vuillard's painting "Garden at Vaucresson" and then to describe how the painting...
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Lesson Plan
Academy of American Poets

Teach This Poem: "Imagine" by Kamilah Aisha Moon

For Teachers 6th - 12th Standards
A lesson about Kamilah Aisha Moon's poem "Imagine" asks young scholars to imagine, "What would happen if...?" If Dr. Martin Luther King's dream became a reality. If Renisha McBride was a white girl and crashed her car in a black...
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Lesson Plan
Academy of American Poets

Teach This Poem: "Old South Meeting House" by January Gill O'Neil

For Teachers 6th - 12th Standards
The vaulted ceiling of the Old South Meeting House has heard many voices. Young scholars read an excerpt about its importance in American history and then do a close reading January Gill O'Neil's poem, "Old South Meeting House." After...
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Lesson Plan
Facing History and Ourselves

Hardship and Hope: Teaching Amanda Gorman's "New Day's Lyric"

For Teachers 6th - 12th Standards
Class members come together to study Amanda Gorman's poem "New Day's Lyric." After a close reading of the poem, learners watch a video of Gorman reading her poem, and then craft additional lines for the poem where they offer suggestions...
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Lesson Plan
Academy of American Poets

Teach This Poem: "On Being Brought from Africa to America" by Phillis Wheatley

For Teachers 6th - 12th Standards
Phillis Wheatley's poem, "On Being Brought from Africa to America" is the focus of a lesson that asks readers to consider how the poem is a critique of slavery. Groups comprise a list of words and phrases they notice as well as questions...
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Lesson Plan
Academy of American Poets

Teach This Poem: "The Tradition" by Jericho Brown

For Teachers 6th - 12th Standards
To begin this lesson, class members examine Antonius Hockelmann's painting "Tree Flowers II," record elements of the painting that they notice, and share their observations with a partner. Next, pupils do a close reading of Jericho...
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Lesson Plan
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National Endowment for the Humanities

Theme Analysis in A Christmas Carol

For Teachers 6th - 12th Standards
Why does Charles Dickens have Ebenezer go from scrooge to light-hearted and generous? From "Bah, humbug!" to "God Bless Us, Every One!" After rereading Dickens' preface to A Christmas Carol, learners analyze quotations from the tale that...