Midland Independent School District
Drama
Ten drama lessons are the perfect addition to your language arts or theater class. With a focus on script elements, plot development, and parts of a dramatic story, the lessons guide young playwrights through the steps of telling a story...
Curated OER
Introduction to Drama
Introduce your class to drama! You cast each pupil as a different character from a story you have read. They are given a general outline of the scene, act out the scene multiple times, then discuss the weak and strong aspects of each...
Write Away!
Voices In the Park
Explore the impact a narrator's point of view has on a story with a reading of the children's book, Voices in the Park by Anthony Browne. Written in four different voices, the story is told and retold from different perspectives to...
Roald Dahl
Matilda - The Platinum-Blond Man
Before reading Chapter Six, "The Platinum-Blond Man" in Matilda, readers preview the illustration of Mrs. Wormwood dropping her plate of food, and think about what may have happened to cause the scene. After reading the chapter, class...
Roald Dahl
Matilda - Throwing the Hammer
Full truth, or an exaggeration? How can you tell when a storyteller is exaggerating a story? Readers analyze a story told by Hortensia, and identify the exaggerative language she uses. Then, learners write their own narrative story using...
Curated OER
Playing with Puns
Students examine the wit of characters in two plays. In this drama lesson plan, students read The Shakespeare Stealer by Gary L. Blackwood and Twelfth Night by Shakespeare. Students analyze the puns used in both plays and write essays...
Curated OER
How To Identify Figurative Language
Students investigate writing techniques by analyzing a chart. In this figurative language lesson, students define similes, metaphors and identify the difference between them and personification. Students demonstrate their understanding...
Gwinnett County Public Schools
Analysis of the Tuck Everlasting and The Birchbark House Text Exemplars
Looking to introduce some text-based questions into your ELA lessons? Practice the kinds of skills the Common Core demands with the seven text-based questions and the essay prompt provided here. Designed to be a three-day lesson, day one...
Syracuse City School District
Literary Elements
Address the literary elements in a piece of writing using these materials. The packet includes plenty of resources, and focuses mainly on theme, character, and point of view, with some materials for setting, symbolism, and author's...
EngageNY
Reviewing Visual Elements of a Graphic Novel: Max Axiom
Pass the tea! Using the resource, scholars participate in a Tea Party protocol to analyze text and images about inventions that helped meet societal demands. After sharing their observations with each other, they discuss visual elements...
Curated OER
Heartsongs Poetry by Mattie Stepanek
Use Mattie Stepanek’s Heartsongs book of poetry to inspire young poets to write about their own lives, experiences, and feelings. After reading the introduction to Mattie’s book, in which he talks about himself and his reasons for...
Curated OER
Reliving History through Slave Narratives
Helpful for an American literature or history unit, this lesson prompts middle schoolers to examine slavery in the United States. They read slave narratives that were part of the Federal Writers' Project and then conduct their own...
Curated OER
A Way with Words or Say What?
Students examine Shakespearean language. In this word study lesson, students investigate the meaning of words that Shakespeare invented. Students draw and pantomime with the words prior to writing short stories that feature Shakespeare's...
Curated OER
Coyote and Anansi
Students explore the structure of folktales. For this coyote and Anansi lesson, students discuss the attributes of folktales as they read versions of tales featuring coyote and Anansi. Students collaborate to write and perform their own...
Curated OER
Understanding Genres
Young scholars identify genres of literature. In this literature instructional activity, young scholars read definitions of the various genres. Young scholars choose books and list clues in the texts that help them identify the...