Curated OER
Presidential Biography: Bicentennial Quarter
A biography is a type of literary genre that everyone needs to be familiar with. Here, the class will read two different biographies of George Washington and discuss how they are similar and different, then decide weather they can glean...
Smithsonian Institution
Affirmation, Assimilation, and Acculturation: Middle School
Latin American culture is deeply embedded in American culture as a whole. From the Latin rock scene in San Francisco to the hip-hop world of New York, Latin American artists have influenced every genre of modern music. Learn about the...
Scholastic
Midnight Magic Discussion Guide
This discussion guide accompanies the fiction book Midnight Magic written by Avi, enforces story elements, inferences, and theme/plot. Have the class work on it over time, it will engage even your reluctant readers.
National Endowment for the Humanities
Character in Place: Eudora Welty’s “A Worn Path” for the Common Core
How do writers use the interaction between elements like characterization and setting to create meaning? Readers of "A Worn Path" create a series of comic book-style graphics of Eudora Welty's short story and reflect on how Welty uses...
Curated OER
Everyone's a Critic: Analyzing Sitcoms as Cultural Texts
Start by defining the word sitcom with the goal of launching a discussion. What exactly is a sitcom? How is a sitcom different from sketch comedy, drama, and reality television? Class members give examples, remember storylines they've...
EBSCO Industries
Music and Poetry
Song lyrics, like poems, are meant to be heard. After examining the literary devices in several poems, scholars examine the lyrics of popular songs and identify the sound devices and the figurative language writers use to create the...
Penguin Books
A Teacher’s Guide to the Signet Classics Edition of Mary Shelley ’s Frankenstein
Contrary to popular belief, the monster's name in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is not Frankenstein. A teacher's guide for the novel helps readers make sense of key details in the text, define vocabulary words, and discuss prominent...
Curated OER
Prometheus Bound: Rebel with a Cause
If you are teaching Aeschylus' Prometheus Bound, you can't afford to miss this source. An extensive list of ideas outlines numerous discussion topics, writing prompts, comprehension questions, oral presentations, and projects. Have class...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Practical Criticism
As an introduction to literary criticism, class members recreate I.A. Richards' close reading experiment. Individuals select a poem, paraphrase the story, focus on the imagery used, consider what the imagery adds to the tale, and...
Novelinks
The Little Prince: Picture Book Strategy
Picture books aren't just for children; they carry strong, valuable messages for adult as well. Explore the audience for Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's The Little Prince with a instructional activity that compares picture books to literature...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Introducing Metaphors Through Poetry
Metaphors are word pictures, creating images in our brains that draw readers to consider how two seemingly unrelated items are alike. Poems by Langston Hughes, Margaret Atwood, and Naomi Shihad Nye provide learners with an opportunity to...
Curated OER
Movie Riddles: An ESL Activity to Get Student Talking About Movies
Enjoy the thrill of the movies with this ESL activity! Not only can learners talk about their favorite films, but in creating riddles about their chosen movies, they can practice the skills of context clues and deductive reasoning. This...
Curated OER
During Reading Strategy: Literary Newspaper
Add some writing to your class's reading of Cold Sassy Tree! With this plan, readers assume the role of journalist and create a segment of a paper with their peers. Suggested segments are included, and a worksheet dividing the text into...
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
Exploring Race Through Literature
Provide your class with an opportunity to examine race through a variety of literary works. They read and analyze a chosen poem, interview, speech, or story describing race in America. They then use key words from the original work to...
Curated OER
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
Guide your class on an adventure 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea with this Hampton-Brown outline. It provides educators with a guide to increase reading comprehension, critical thinking, literary analysis, and reading strategies. This...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Tales of the Supernatural
Scary stuff! Whether approached as the first horror story or a "serious imaginative exploration of the human condition," Frankenstein continues to engage readers. Here's a packet of activities that uses Mary Shelley's gothic novel to...
Curated OER
The Breaking of Charity
The danger of mob mentality is on display in The Crucible by Arthur Miller. Get your class thinking with some challenging quickwrite questions, then assign characters from the play to be read aloud altogether. Links to worksheets for...
Curated OER
During Reading Strategy for Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations
Readers create a literary scrapbook for one of the characters in Charles Dickens' Great Expectations and fill it with mementoes, journal entries, letters, etc. A great way to get kids to think about characterization.
Film English
Serial Taxi
Explore the murder mystery genre through film, discussion, and writing. The plan features several activities centered around a two-minute video that include collaboration, writing, and prediction. After the lesson, individuals write...
EngageNY
Gathering Evidence and Drafting a Two-Voice Poem (Chapter 13: "Los Duraznos/Peaches")
Begin class with a short comprehension quiz and review and then move into a new genre: two-voice poems. The activity provides information about this type of poetry as well as a video example made by eighth graders that you can show your...
Trinity University Digital Commons
Romanticism: Past and Present
With its focus on nature, individualism, imagination, and rejection of traditional authority, Romanticism has great appeal to young high schoolers. After examining classic paintings and poems as well as current works, class members...
Maine Content Literacy Project
Introduction to John Updike
Expand your pupils' understanding of the short story genre with a study of John Updike and his story "A&P." This lesson plan, the fourth in a series of fourteen, invites learners to examine literary terms and read and discuss the...
Penguin Books
Teacher's Guide: Kindred by Octavia E. Butler
A teacher's guide for Kindred provides instructors with a wealth of materials to enrich either a full-class reading or independent study of Octavia E. Butler's popular science fiction novel. The activities are designed to encourage...
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