From Cinco de Mayo to Endangered Species day to National Hamburger Month, May is full of ideas to write about. Give young writers prompts that have everything to do with the month of May. Topics include writing a story, conducting...

Even supposed Utopian societies have their flaws. Using an educator's guide, individuals explore the society Ally Condie creates in Matched. Reflective writing prompts double as discussion questions and cover key themes in the novel, as...

Have your young television viewers discuss popular shows among their peers. After choosing one show to analyze, middle and high schoolers read about the 2007-2008 network television lineup with the New York Times article "Gauging...

The Renaissance is the theme of a five-week unit designed to boost reading comprehension, spelling, vocabulary, and expository writing skills. Scholars listen to and discuss daily readings and engage in skills practice activities...

Discuss and reflect on the concept of allies and alliances. The class examines the competition between the United States and Venezuela. Using the New York Times, they search for examples of geopolitical alliances. In addition, they write...

Secondary schoolers investigate the debate surrounding the current sexual abuse crisis in the Catholic Church with this New York Times instructional activity. Through discussions and written reflection, they explore their own thoughts...

Students write to influence positive change. In this service learning lesson, students reflect on their service learning experiences as they journal about sharing their time, talent, and treasures. Students share their journals with...

Some words are best left unspoken.  Words matter, according to Benjamin Zander, conductor, teacher, and lecturer. To illustrate his point, Zander recounts a story told to him by a survivor of Auschwitz. As a result of her experience...

Helpful for an American literature or history unit, this lesson prompts middle schoolers to examine slavery in the United States. They read slave narratives that were part of the Federal Writers' Project and then conduct their own...

"How can a magazine reflect a particular time and culture?" Using this prompt, your class explores the Victorian Era as it relates to Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre. They can also play the "Victorian Women's Rights" game for the year 1840...

Use the constructive ideas in this resource to assist in developing your own career writing project for your junior high or young high school scholars. The resource provides step-by-step plans for the educator and learners, as well...

Examine the historic election of Pope Benedict XVI and reflect on the challenges he faces as the new leader of the Catholic Church. This New York Times lesson investigates how other world leaders are chosen in different forms of...

Readers reflect on enjoyable stories they know, brainstorm criteria that make a story "good," analyze a New York Times article about innovative children's performances, re-envision classics on their own, and peer edit drafts. Use this as...

An activity focused on tolerance encourages class members to consider how they might respond when they or someone else is the target of oppression and discrimination. After researching how some key figures responded to the...

Students explore journal writing. In this writing lesson, students are given writing prompts such as "how the choices I make affect our water quality?" and use critical writing skills to express their feelings in a journal. There are...

Are history textbooks plagiarized? The New York Times article, “Schoolbooks Are Given F’s in Originality,” looks at this question and forms the basis for a lesson on textbooks and plagiarism. The very detailed plan includes resource...

Celebrate traditions and cultures around the world with a set of worksheets and printables. Fourth and fifth graders can create booklets or simply participate in individual studies of specific holidays in different countries. From lined...

The New York Times article “Online Diary,” launches this study of websites and how to assess them. Richly detailed, the lesson includes warm-up activities, procedures, journal prompts, discussion questions, and links to valuable...

A lesson examines the holidays, Día de los Muertos and Halloween. After an exciting clip from the movie Coco, class members review vocabulary and discuss what they know about Halloween. The conversation leads into the history of Día...

Second graders practice their reading comprehension by analyzing stories they read in class. In this children's literature lesson, 2nd graders are assigned to read a book for 20 minutes each day in class and also reflect on it in their...

Fourth graders write about the forced Potawatomi migration. In this primary source lesson students are read journal entries from an emigrating party of Potawatomi Indians. Students reflect on the items the Indians might have taken with...

Third graders relate the concept of individuality of geometric shapes to the individuality of topic sentences. They write and revise a persuasive argument essay using an established rubric.

How can the rhetorical structure of an editorial help to develop its argument? Use this New York Times editorial to emphasize the importance of structure in a piece of informational text. Adolescent writers then use the editorial as a...

Are you looking for a way to teach sequence of events in your narrative writing unit? Bring this lesson to your middle school class, as it prompts young writers to create a narrative sequence map of events that have happened at school...