Does the fastest one always win the race? Look deeper into The Tortoise and the Hare with a set of discussion questions for before, during, and after reading the story.

To establish a context for an assessment or a study of pioneers and the American frontier in the 1800s, groups examine photos and record observations about clothing, housing, and travel.

Houses come in all shapes and sizes, but not all houses are safe from Mr. and Mrs. Twit. The 10th lesson in a unit designed to accompany The Twits by Roald Dahl turns learners into architects. While designing houses for the monkeys, they...

Making inferences and drawing conclusions is a key component to successful active reading. Encourage your class to use context clues and prior knowledge to infer different elements of a story, including the setting, plot, and character...

Family and Friends is the theme of a unit offering extra support lessons. Follow each lesson plan's teach, blend, guided practice or practice/apply routine to reinforce concepts such as clusters, responding to reading, drawing...

Inferencing is a necessary reading skill to uncover non-explicit messages in text. Use the set of resources as a way to guide learners toward becoming expert inferrers through reading prompts and literature with text and without text.

Scholars work in pairs to decide whether leaders wrote the Declaration of Independence for the rich and powerful or for every man. To draw their conclusion, pairs read excerpts from two historians and complete a graphic organizer...

Scholars become detectives in a lesson that focuses on primary sources. Learners practice their observational skills by examining the teacher's artifact and visiting the Show and Tell Museum that highlihgts items from peers and...

Gaining practice in translating a verbal description into a diagram and then an equation is the real point of this similar triangles exercise. Once the diagram is drawn, multiple methods are provided to reach the conclusion. An effective...

Many informational texts are written as factual, but can your learners determine when an opinion is presented as fact? Have your kids read several articles on the same topic and record the statements that contain either facts or...

Fish, fowl, foul fish, or foul fowl? Just what is a siren? Young scholars listen to a video clip and draw what they imagine when they hear the word "siren." After watching several videos depicting sirens, class members read "The Sirens'...

Middle and high schoolers read and discuss articles about the mussel industry in Arkansas. They pay close attention to the history of pearling and button making industries on the Black and White Rivers of Arkansas. This impressive,...

Is there a correlation between a country's wealth and the extent of its ecological footprint? What exactly constitutes an ecological footprint, and how does one country stack up against the rest? This is a unique lesson plan to...

Enhance a reading of the Caldecott Medal-winning children's book Joseph had a Little Overcoat by Simms Taback with this collection of learning activities. Starting with general background information about the book and author,...

What important facts about Dr. Seuss influenced the Read Across America movement...? This is the driving question of a research project that requires scholars to find information about Dr. Seuss' life and work. Class...

Begin your discussion about Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility before you even open the book. Kids fill in a worksheet that lists five statements about the literary themes of the novel, and then discuss their opinions as a...

In May of 1981, the Winter Park Sinkhole in Florida first appeared and is now referred to as Lake Rose. Scholars learn about the causes of sinkholes through an inquiry project. Then, they analyze recent data and draw conclusions to...

This teaching packet is for grades five through eight, and it is organized around geographic themes: location, place, relationships, movement, and regions. There are four full lessons that are complete with posters, weblinks, and...

To gain a better understanding of Hispanic heritage and culture, as well as to build informational comprehension skill, learners explore facets of Hispanic American History. They engage in a class discussion, research three facts, and...

Identifying themes in literature is the focus of the language arts lesson plan presented here. Learners read short pieces of fiction and practice the skill of identifying the themes present in each one. The bulk of the lesson consists of...

To continue their study of the Civil War, Reconstruction, and the beginning of the civil rights movement, class members watch the YouTube video of Billie Holiday singing "Strange Fruit" as an introduction to an examination of...

Enzymes play a role in almost every function in the human body. Scholars explore three variables related to the use of enzymes. They observe a catalase reaction, experiment with substrates, and examine reactions rates. 

Often our decisions are impacted by a fear of how others see us. That's the big idea in a two-day lesson that asks how false assumptions, how our fear of how others may see us, impact how we act. After watching a video about such a...

Does the lens of history portray George Washington as a good leader? A three-lesson unit looks at Washington's early military career as the commander of the Virginia Regiment, his role in the fight for independence...