Curated OER
Facing the Ghosts of Our Past
A reading of a New York Times review of the movie Beloved launches research into how the Civil War affected the lives of people living during this period. Creative thinkers select a person from an included list of historical figures and...
Curated OER
Children's Media and Censorship
High schoolers form opinions about children and television censorship after analyzing literature. They complete a journal writing activity to identify the topic and make a list of inappropriate television shows for children. Next, they...
Curated OER
Compare and Contrast Poems vs. Lyrics
Combine your pupils' love of music with their growing knowledge of poetry! First, have them bring in their favorite songs for a discussion on word choice and literary devices. Then, use a Venn Diagram to compare and contrast the...
Curated OER
Image: A Nation
Students use photographs as a basis for a creative writing piece that explores the characters, relationships, and settings revealed in the images.
University of Arizona
Identity Repair
In a detailed, creative writing task, potential poets analyze how race, identity, and society categorize and (mis)represent us. The learning begins with an imaginative anticipatory set where young scholars describe unique situations that...
Curated OER
House and Holmes: A Guide to Deductive and Inductive Reasoning
Test your pupils' reasoning skills with several activities and a quick mystery to solve. Learners watch and analyze a few video clips that demonstrate reasoning in action, practice deduction with an interactive and collaborative...
Curated OER
American Rhythms
Students combine elements of music with poetry. In this creative writing lesson, students examine poems from a variety of authors with varying writing styles. Students explore the different elements of poetry, including tone, rhythm,...
Curated OER
Creative Characterization
Students write a character description journal in which they take on the voice of one of the character's made-up friends or relatives. They write a sketch of that character from the friend or relatives' point of view.
Curated OER
A New Spin on Letter Writing Lessons
Letter writing lessons can provide a way to introduce students to this important mode of communication.
Curated OER
Writing About Art: Objective vs. Subjective
Learners examine the sculpture "Head With Horns" by Paul Gauguin. In this perspectives lesson, students discuss what the terms "objective" and "subjective" means. Learners are shown the sculpture and write their subjective and objective...
Curated OER
Homemade Holidays
Foster your high schoolers' creativity - and generosity - with this writing lesson. After reading the article "Homemade Holiday Gifts" by Frances Janisch (from the GALE Student Resource Center - Gold), pupils meet in groups to brainstorm...
Curated OER
Who Wrote That?
Scholars creatively respond to writing prompts. They respond to writing prompts that reveal clues regarding their personalities and then use the prompts written in class to guess the prompts that belong to their classmates.
Curated OER
Truth and Lies Games
Students participate in a get to know you activity. In this social instructional activity, students write three statements about themselves. One is true and the other is false. Students read their cards and their peers decide what is...
Curated OER
Writing to Photography/Photography to Writing
Young scholars improve their' writing by incorporating photography into descriptive and narrative writing exercises. They write descriptions of various professional photographic collections. Later they use their own and other classmates'.
Curated OER
Invent a Holiday
Who wouldn't want to create their own holiday? Use the 12 elements of a holiday to have learners of all ages create their own holiday. These days, it seems like we make any excuse for a holiday! Consider having some fun with your kids...
Curated OER
In Cold Blood: A During Reading Activity
Following the method used by Truman Capote, class members research a major character from his novel, In Cold Blood, and then conduct an interview with that character. The resulting research is used to craft a newspaper article about the...
Curated OER
Teaching Sequence of Activities
Students develop their skills at writing poetry by listening to poetry and using a model to emulate and write a poem. In this poetry writing lesson, students listen to Louis MacNeice's poem 'Prayer Before Birth' and use it to model their...
Curated OER
2002: The Year In Review
Students research and create a book highlighting significant events and trends throughout the world in the year 2002. Then, through creative writing, they respond to the events or trends themselves and how they affected our world.
Curated OER
Thomas Jefferson's Library: Making the Case for a National Library
Students examine a letter written by Thomas Jefferson. In this lesson plan on the Thomas Jefferson Library, students discover a methodology for creative writing by examining Jefferson's letter to congress explaining why they should...
Curated OER
Adjective? What's an Adjective?
Mount a variety of pictures (fantasy, rustic, portraits, action) on large sheets of paper and post them around the classroom. Groups rotate from poster to poster, adding adjectives to describe each of the pictures. Writers use these word...
National Endowment for the Humanities
“House by the Railroad”: A Painting and a Poem for the Common Core
Introduce your class to ekphrastic poetry with an exercise that asks them to examine Edward Hooper's painting House by the Railroad and Edward Hirsch's poem "Edward Hopper and the House By the Railroad." After a close reading of the two...
Curated OER
Picture Perfect Poetry
Do your language arts students love to draw? Use this instructional activity to reinforce poetic techniques with illustration. After drawing what they think poem would look like with no words, middle and high schoolers work on several...
Curated OER
Writing a News Report
Students explore journalism by analyzing current events. For this news report lesson, students identify important questions to ask during an interview and discuss a fictitious news story about a missing teacher. Students read published...
Curated OER
Write It, Read It, Solve It
Writers create an original mystery and have a chance to put it into movie format. The classic elements of a mystery must be present: the crime, the suspects, the motive, the solution and clues. Use iPhoto and Quicktime Movie to integrate...