Alliterative adjective nicknames generate stories inspired by Rosemary Wells' book Noisy Nora (also a thematic complement to any class with children who make a ruckus to get attention). Class members explore basic story elements --...

Primary learners grasp sequence of events by discussing morning routines and reviewing the story of Little Red Riding Hood. They explore the necessity of correct order of events. As a class, create a story with a beginning, middle, and...

Practice sequencing with your 2nd graders via Patricia Polacco's Civil War book Pink and Say. Begin with a blindfold and a bag of mystery items. Connect their use of clues to identify what they can't see with the skill of making...

Youngsters listen to the story, "There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly." After discussing the story, going over new vocabulary, and repeating the rhymes in the story, they study the parts of a fly. They finish by creating a fly on...

Using the folk tale "The Man, The Boy, and The Donkey" (linked in the instructional activity) and a SMART board, teachers can help pupils access multiple skills. Reading the story allows learners to create a timeline of the sequence of...

Honing reading and communication skills through the theme of farm animals is the focus of this lesson. Students read a book about Scandinavian farm animals and complete prediction journal activities. They complete a worksheet about the...

Young children read the story, Berlioz the Bear and complete various reading and writing activities. They learn about fiction and non-fiction, and complete graphing and writing activities for the story. Youngsters draw the bear and use...

Strap on those backpacks, it's time to travel through history with this literature unit based on the first four books of The Magic Tree House series. While reading through these fun stories, children create story maps, record...

Explore the Great Depression! Discover the challenges people experienced during the time period. Learners investigate photographs from the Dust Bowl and WWII era and create a story line about the photographs, writing a newspaper article...

It's all about using peer resources in this writing process lesson, which includes a fantastic novel revision worksheet packet. Learners have read a partner's story draft the night before, and groups have a "lightning round of...

In this 2-day instructional activity focused on exponents, middle schoolers will cross the curriculum by engaging in science, history and language arts activities. Exponential growth will be explored using grains of rice on a chess...

First graders sequence story situations.  In this sequencing lesson, 1st graders read Charlie the Caterpillar and sequence his life cycle.  Students role play the story parts and sing a song about metamorphosis.

Practice sequencing as a comprehension strategy. Have your class listen to The Mitten by Jan Brett and participate in guided practice with sequencing events. Then divide everyone into three groups based on understanding for...

Read this twist on Goldilocks and the Three Bears: Dusty Locks and the Three Bears by Susan Lowell. Kindergartners listen, predict, and discuss the story. They then participate in a dramatization of the story and draw a picture...

Help your middle-schoolers expand their writing skills with this lesson on episodic writing, which focuses on story details, idea development, and organization. After reading "The Eighth Picture: End of Summer" from Patricia Reilly...

Analyzing the sequence of actions in dramatic stories leads to deeper comprehension of story structure. The class identifies the main actions in each section of a story and develops frozen tableau's for the identified actions of the...

Students visit a pumpkin farm and discuss the characteristics of a pumpkin and how they grow. They create a class story about the trip to the farm with each student supplying a sequence for the story.

Weaving is an important part of Navajo culture. Read The Goat in the Rug to your fourth and fifth graders, and give them a glimpse into the process of rug making from the point of view of a goat! They will learn new vocabulary words and...

Pupils create a storybook using vocabulary from the topic "urban and rural life". They write about past events in a children's story. They present their story to the class at an author's tea.

Improve your youngsters' descriptive writing. They study an object and write about what they see as a warm-up, then they read an excerpt from Paul Guest's memoir, One More Theory about Happiness. The next part of the...

Combine vocabulary development and a study of verb tenses with a general introduction to sports. Class members get acquainted with the language associated with sports, and then complete a project to design and describe their own...

Examine the differences between totalitarianism and democracy in this writing lesson. Using the same format and theme from Great Expectations, young writers work in pairs to compose their own short stories. They follow guidelines for the...

Are we really all that different from people in the past? First, learners of all ages write an autobiographical poem. Then, they research the lives of historical figures. They use the same format that they used to write their own poem to...

Students explore storytelling by participating in an image analysis activity. In this story structure lesson, students read the book Cookie's Week by Tomie dePaola and retell the story to their teacher in sequential order. Students...