Two versions of movie trailers for the film Mary Poppins launch a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious instructional activity about how mood and tone impact a reader's experience of work. Using the provided list, readers identify the words...

Emily Dickinson's "Because I could not stop for Death" provides high schoolers with an opportunity to practice their critical thinking skills. They examine the images, diction, rhythm, and rhyme scheme the poet uses and consider how...

Line, shape, color, texture, space. The first in a three-part series of lessons intended for advanced theatre arts classes introduces the elements of set design. Class members examine maquettes and analyze how designers have put together...

We have an appointment! Scholars meet with another discussion appointment to discuss the text structure of the poem "Incident" by Countee Cullen. They use a Note Catcher to guide their thinking and compare the structure to chapter 8 of...

Identifying the tone of a piece of writing or the author's attitude toward the subject matter can be difficult for learners. Simplify the process with a lesson that begins with skits, moves to songs and their lyrics, and then to passages...

A band of brothers or the Devil's agents? Nobel warriors freeing the oppressed or mercenaries working for the military/industrial complex? Groups examine poems from the Civil War, World War I, and World War II to determine the poets'...

The set for a play combines design elements (style, line, shape, mass, measure, position, color, and texture) and principles of composition (unity, harmony, contrast, variation, balance, proportion, and emphasis) to create a particular...

Students explore the basic color wheel and the ways that artists use color to guide the viewer's attention through a painting's composition. A creation of a sense of depth in a two dimensional space and the effect of color on mood and...

Young scholars learn how to distinguish between the mood of a piece of writing (how the work makes the reader feel) and the tone (the writer's attitude toward the material) in the sixth lesson in a poetry unit. After watching two very...

Tone is a tough topic to teach to teenagers. But never, fear, help is here in the form of a unit plan that takes advantage of their interest in music to set the stage for a series of activities that lead them to understand how setting,...

Traditionally, a United States President's Inaugural Address establishes the tone and vision for his presidency. It has stressed the goal to unify the country and bring the political parties together after what are often divisive...

Current immigration issues and the rhetoric surrounding the controversies come into focus with a lesson that uses Richard Blanco's anthem, "The U.S. of Us," written after the August 2019 attack in El Paso, Texas, to open a discussion of...

Tone and Mood are not synonymous! Introduce young readers to these literary devices with a series of exercises that not only point out the significant differences between the terms but also shows them how to identify both the tone and...

Over the course of a 12-lesson language arts unit, young scholars analyze a variety of poems taking a close look at figurative language and tone. They learn to compare and contrast, improve comprehension, and identify settings. To...

Rudyard Kipling's "Rikki-Tikki-Tavi" and a song from the musical "Hamilton" allow middle schoolers to practice using punctuation to indicate whether sentences are indicative, imperative, or interrogative. 

Poe goes high tech with a lesson that asks high schoolers to use the internet and various apps as they read and analyze "The Masque of the Red Death." In addition to responding to comprehension questions in Quizlet, they use Minecraft to...

Poems are meant to be heard. Hearing a poem being read enriches one’s understanding of the tone and mood of the piece. Introduce your class to the sounds of poetry with a packet that not only details how to use poetry recordings in the...

Young scholars consider how film soundtracks can help support not only the mood but also the tone of a scene. After viewing two very different trailers for the same film, class members create their own soundtracks for two party...

As part of their study of set design, theater arts learners put together what they have learned so far and create a thumbnail sketch of a set that they feel captures the style and mood they want to project. 

After reading "The Bullet," a particularly intense chapter in Victor Martinez's Parrot in the Oven: Mi Vida, class members listen to the Spanish and the English versions of "Dimelo" by Enrique Iglesias. They then discuss how the...

Kurt Vonnegut's short story "Harrison Bergeron" engages adolescents with its theme about the dangers of complete societal equality. Learners complete a graphic organizer to track literary elements in the story, as well as an inference...

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...

Nikki Wallschlaeger's Violin is the featured poem in a lesson that uses music and multiple readings to delve deep into its analysis. After a writing warm-up, learners watch and listen to a video that showcases Regina Carter...

Students create and perform a scene for play using a common fairy tale for the story line. They view and discuss a video on careers in stage and radio to identify the roles and responsibilities for each of their group members.