Curated OER
It's All in the Way You Say It
High schoolers unearth multiple meanings based on connotation and cadence. After defining denotation, connotation, and cadence, readers evaluate similar words to compare connotations. They then play with how cadence affects meaning by...
Curated OER
"Shooting An Elephant": George Orwell's Essay on His Life in Burma
High school readers examine George Orwell's essay "Shooting an Elephant" for examples of symbolism, metaphor, connotation, and irony. They analyze how these literary tools convey the writer's main point and contribute to the persuasive...
Curated OER
Choosing Words Carefully
Use literacy tools to select precise vocabulary. High schoolers respond to discussion questions that require them to consider the denotation and connotation of words. They then read non-fiction passages and identify words in the passages...
Curated OER
"Shooting an Elephant"
Study selected vocabulary terms in George Orwell's "Shooting an Elephant." A chart includes five selections, and learners must record the connotative and denotative meaning for each. A great look at using the context to define vocabulary...
K20 LEARN
Things Are Lit at Thornfield: Jane Eyre
Jane Eyre offers scholars an opportunity to practice reading comprehension skills. Pairs are assigned a word from the text, use their prior knowledge, and consider the context, connotation, and denotation of the word to posit a...
Penguin Books
A Teacher's Guide to the Signet Classics Edition of H.G. Wells's The Time Machine
Imagine being able to travel back and forth in time! H.G. Wells uses that scenario in his novel The Time Machine to comment on what he saw as the flaws in Victorian society and the industrial age. This teacher's guide is one of the best...
Santa Ana Unified School District
Early American Poets
The poems of Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson are the focus of a unit that asks readers to consider how an artist's life and changes in society influences his or her work. After careful study of Whitman's and Dickinson's perspectives on...
Deer Valley Unified School District
Close Reading: Analyzing Mood and Tone
The AP Literature and Composition exam is all about close reading. Test takers are presented with a passage and asked to analyze how an author uses literary devices to create a desired effect. Prepare your students for the exam with a...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment
Pain and suffering do not have to be inevitable in a study of Crime and Punishment. A carefully scaffolded lesson plan introduces readers to the divided natures of the characters in Fyodor Dostoevsky's complex novel. Groups use the...
Texas Education Agency (TEA)
Reference Guides (English III Reading)
An interactive resource introduces users to dictionaries, glossaries, and thesauri and the significant differences among these reference guides. Users learn which reference is best for which kind of search, examine sample entries from...
Curated OER
Bloody Business
Students research word frequencies in Macbeth and create a frozen picture inspired by a word. For this Macbeth lesson, students view Blood Will Have Blood and discuss the dual meaning of the word "blood." Students identify five major...
Curated OER
Back to School: Style Analysis
Jump back into expository writing and analysis at the start of a new school year! Start with a review of an authors' stylistic choices in diction, syntax, treatment of subject matter, and figurative language. Writers choose a text to...
Shakespeare Uncovered
Henry IV, Part I: Does Father Know Best?
“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...
Mr. Ambrose
The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald
Good discussion questions, quizzes, and tests teach as well as assess. Readers of The Great Gatsby will learn much from the materials in a 36-page packet designed to help students prepare for the AP Literature exam. Included in the...
Schools United to Provide Enhanced Resources Network
AP English Project: Journal of Literary Terms and Devices
To prepare for the AP English exams, individuals are asked to create a notebook of literary terms and devices. The terms must be defined, accompanied by representative artwork, and illustrated by an example drawn for a named source. A...
Curated OER
Metaphor
High schoolers identify the distinction between literal and figurative language with a focus on metaphors. They complete a metaphor analysis chart, then practice expanding metaphors by composing their own comparisons of elements of the...
Curated OER
No Regrets: a Poetry Analysis
Learners read a poem and use the TPCASTT strategy for analysis. In this poetry analysis lesson, students journal about their future goals and read John Updike's "Ex-Basketball Player." Learners discuss the purpose of the poem and...
National Endowment for the Humanities
From Courage to Freedom: Slavery's Dehumanizing Effects
Learners analyze slavery and its effects on humanity using Frederick Douglass' autobiography. In this slavery instructional activity, high schoolers analyze instances of reality and romanticized myth using a slave narrative. Learners...
Curated OER
Lord of the Flies - Sentence Starters and Vocabulary
Students prepare for the reading of iam Golding's novel, The Lord of the Flies, by exploring the theme through a discussion and sentence starter activity.
Curated OER
Don't Forget to Say Thanks
Students practice descriptive writing in a thank-you note format. In this descriptive writing lesson, students read the example letter and analyze the corrections in the letter. Students read the example thank you notes and focus on the...
Curated OER
Preparing for Poetry: A Reader's First Steps
Students complete poetry analysis using William Shakespeare's "Sonnet 130" as a part of a study of figurative language. In this Shakespearean language lesson, students define literal and figurative language and practice paraphrasing and...