Enhance narrative writing instruction with engaging and interactive planning pages. Eight lessons take authors through the process of writing a narrative story, two lessons prompt writers to create a personal narrative, and a...

Create your own adventure story ... well, not really. The fifth instructional activity in a 21-part series has pairs create story contexts for division problems. The instructional activity presents a step-by-step process for pupils to...

Authors are constantly leaving clues that help the reader to understand the sequence of events in a story. Teach young readers how to pick up on these key temporal words and phrases with this slide show. After an introduction to commonly...

What steps did Henry "Box" Brown take while planning his own escape from slavery? Learners work in groups to analyze segments of Brown's narrative and identify the sequence of the most important events of his story.

Explore the structure of narrative writing with this fun, collaborative instructional activity. Start by reading aloud a short story, asking small groups of learners to fill in key events on a large story board prepared on the class...

This packet, the first in the series of support materials for the Houghton Mifflin Harcourt thematic units on silly stories, contains enrichment activities for learners who have mastered the basic concepts of the lessons.

Narrative essay writing is the focus of a series of exercises that model for learners how to not only read a narrative, but how to also examine the techniques fiction writers use to create a setting, develop their characters, represent...

Invite your young writers to take the reins with writing dialogue. Using two characters of their own creation, kids work with partners and then individually to write short conversations.

Take steps into sequences. An 11-lesson unit builds upon pupils' previous understanding of writing expressions to develop the idea of sequences. The resource explores both arithmetic and geometric sequences using recursive and explicit...

Encourage scholars to retell their favorite short story or folktale, adding personal details to make it their own. After reading their book of choice several times, story tellers retell a tale verbally to their classmates. 

Here's a packet designed especially for those kids who need extra support with the basic concepts in the Houghton Mifflin Harcourt thematic units on American stories.

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,...

How can something be true even if it didn't happen? Invite your classes to investigate the truths found in the world of magical realism as they analyze short stories, poems, informational texts, video, and art from this genre.

A reading of Peggy Parish's Amelia Bedelia launches a study of idioms. Groups then select several idioms, write the meaning of the expressions, draw or select images, and use GIMP or Photoshop to create an idiom book. 

Wes Magee's poem "The Chimney Boy's Story" about chimney sweeps/climbing boys is used as an introduction to a lesson that asks groups to research child labor in Victorian Britain. 

Energize a shared reading of the Magic School Bus and the Electric Field Trip with this collection of supplemental materials. Whether your looking for discussion questions, reading comprehension worksheets, or writing prompts,...

Bring your learners together to write a class narrative about the first day of school. Start off by teaching them about sequence with a quick oral activity. Then, work together to fill out a story map. Finally, compose the class...

How does HIV operate at the molecular level? Pupils discover the progression from a healthy immune cell to one infected with HIV, watch an animation of the HIV life cycle, and finally identify each of the stages with illustrations...

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...

Class members explore cultural diversity through a variety of texts that showcase the importance of traditions. Then, they interview their family members to research their own cultural background and write their findings on quilt...

Scholars participate in chants, grand discussions, and complete practice pages in a We Can Do It! themed unit. Designed to provide extra support, the assortment of lessons cover topics such as r-controlled vowels, comparatives...

How can evidence and perspective challenge even the most well-known of stories? Through primary and secondary source analysis, think-alouds, and discussion, young historians evaluate the historical narrative of Rosa Parks across multiple...

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...

Learners develop verbal and visual representations of events from the story of the U.S. folklore character Paul Bunyan. Learners work together to put these events in sequential order on an informal timeline. Learners then write in their...