Curated OER
What Do You See at the Pond?
With What Do You See at the Pond?, young readers explore pond life and practice reading strategies. Learners first make predictions and then read the simple story independently. After a second read-through with a partner, kids come...
Curated OER
Genre Lesson: Realistic Fiction
As scholars begin identifying stories as realistic fiction, its important they see many examples to solidify their concepts of this genre. Readers begin with a personal connection, thinking of television shows they like and determining...
Pace University
Genres in Literature
Enthusiastic readers take part in a book club unit that focuses on genre, particularly historical fiction, fantasy, and adventure. Over the course of 10 days, groups read a variety of stories and choose leveled activities from a learning...
Penguin Books
Using Thirteen Reasons Why in the Classroom
Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher helps bring difficult, but important, topics such as suicide and bullying into the classroom. An educator's guide for the novel provides activities and discussion questions to help teens explore the...
Penguin Books
An Educators' Guide to Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys
Books can help teens understand complex global issues. A helpful educator's guide introduces readers to what it's like to be a refugee. Lesson components for the novel Shades of Gray include an anticipation guide and writing and research...
Curriculum Corner
Academic Reading Vocabulary
From A to Z, learners define, draw, and find examples of specific reading focus skills in an alphabetized reading vocabulary packet. Words include dialogue, theme, text structure, genre, paraphrase, and many more.
Santillana USA
Celebra Kwanzaa
¡Celebramos Kwanzaa! Celebrate Kwanzaa through the fictional story Celebra Kwanzaa con Botitas y sus gatitos to delightfully explain the seven principles of Kwanzaa. Dual language learners participate in reading and vocabulary activities...
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Incredible Stories: Extra Support Lessons (Theme 3)
The materials in this 40-page packet are designed for learners who need extra support in order to understand the concepts in a thematic unit on fantasy and realism.
Curated OER
Maniac Magee: A 5th Grade Literature Guide
There's no need to run around trying to plan a unit for the book Maniac Magee, the work has already been done for you. Through a series of whole class, small group, and independent lessons and activities, students practice synthesizing...
Curated OER
Frindle: A Guiding Reading Unit
Guide your class through a reading of the popular children's book, Frindle, with this comprehensive literature unit. Starting with a brief introduction to the guided reading process, the class goes on to read the story two chapters at a...
Storytelling World
Maniac Magee
Add to children's enjoyment of the award-winning novel Maniac Magee with this fun collection of resources. From sequence of events and fact or fiction worksheets, to writing newspaper articles and creating advertisements based on the...
Curated OER
Lesson 4: Theme Matters
This useful approach to determining themes based on specific details from a book is aimed at readers of Jerry Spinelli's Maniac Magee. It could also easily be adapted for use with other books or readings. The class identifies recurring...
Curated OER
Guided Reading with David's Drawings by Cathryn Falwell
First graders participate in a guided reading activity. In this guided reading activity, 1st graders read David's Drawings by Cathryn Falwell, which is a realistic fiction book on the DRA:16 level. They determine the author's message,...
Curated OER
Theme Matters
Fifth graders read to find the purpose of a piece of writing. They explore the theme of Bridge to Terabithia through events in the story. Furthermore, they consider how they would find a theme and examine a new text for its theme.
Curated OER
What is a Make Believe Story?
Explore the concept of make believe stories. In this genres of literature lesson, students discover the difference between realistic fiction and fantasy. They are asked questions during and after the reading of a book to ensure the...
Curated OER
John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men: Fun Trivia Quiz
Quiz your class for basic plot understanding, character recognition, and quote recall with this ten-question online quiz. After choosing their answers to the multiple choice questions about John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, learners can...
Curated OER
Lesson 5: Theme Matters
Young scholars explore themes in fiction with this literacy comprehension lesson. They generate ideas for possible themes developed in the fairy tale of The Ant and the Cricket. Next, they examine the plot of The Great Gilly Hopkins and...
Curated OER
Analyzing Relationships
Fifth graders analyze character relationships. In this analyzing relationships lesson, 5th graders read The Great Gilly Hopkins and describe how the characters feel about one another as well as the positive and negative aspects of their...
Curated OER
Identifying Plot Conflicts
Fifth graders identify plot conflicts in the text. In this plot conflict lesson, 5th graders read Dogs Don't Tell Jokes and recognize examples of character vs. self and character vs. character.
Curated OER
Character and Relationship Changes
Fifth graders examine how characters and relationships can change in a text. In this realistic fiction instructional activity, 5th graders identify changes in the characters and relationships while reading The Great Gilly Hopkins....
Curated OER
Realistic Fiction
Explore the characteristics of realistic fiction by reading and then analyzing the book, Allie’s Basketball Dream by Barbara E. Barber. Using the I do, we do, you do model, learners practice identifying realistic fiction based on how...
Curated OER
Intermediate Guided Reading Lesson Plan
Young scholars read Knots on a Counting Rope, by Bill Martin Jr. and John Archambault. In this guided reading lesson, students evaluate the characteristics of a realistic fiction piece. They are asked comprehension questions during and...
Curated OER
A Turkey for Thanksgiving - Lesson #2
Second graders investigate realistic fiction, holiday celebrations, making tally charts. In this multi-disciplinary lesson, 2nd graders listen to a story about Thanksgiving and one about the Chinese New Year to develop an understanding...
Curated OER
Understanding Realistic Fiction
Students write a story. In this genres lesson, students learn the meaning of realistic fiction and write a short story in that genre.