"Now is the summer of our happiness/Made winter by this sudden, fierce attack!" Luke Skywalker meets Hamlet in a 10-lesson unit based on Ian Doescher's William Shakespeare's Star Wars: Verily, a New Hope. Using Star Wars® as source...

Scholars read four brief poems and analyze their word usage in order to identify the rhyme scheme. 

Two exercises boost scholars' knowledge of a onomatopoeia with excerpts from famous poems. In exercise one, participants circle onomatopoeia words. Exercise two challenges writers to choose three words to use in an...

Explore a variety of fables to learn life's lessons through engaging stories. Add rigor to the learning process with activities that include matching a a fable to the story's moral, short answer exit slips, and a three-column graphic...

Class members take center stage as groups perform scenes from Ian Doescher's William Shakespeare's Star Wars: Verily, A New Hope. Actors are encouraged to add stage directions to the script, as well as create costumes and props to...

As writers continue to revise their argument essays, the focus shifts to editing grammatical conventions, parallel structure, and varying syntax to add interest. After examining model sentences that demonstrate sentence variety, writers...

Class members have an opportunity to compare how a film and a play handle the same source material by viewing the opening chapters of George Lucas's Star Wars: A New Hope and acts I and II of Ian Doescher's play, William...

How did the women's rights movement create a ripple effect, improving the lives of future generations? Scholars read and analyze paragraphs 11-12 of "An Address by Elizabeth Cady Stanton," in which the author emphasizes the importance of...

Make reading more enjoyable and interactive with literature circles! Here you'll find detailed lessons to begin the literature circle process. Ten lessons introduce each role learners take on. Literature circle roles include...

What did the Crusades and plantations do with the global sugar spread? As class members continue their study of Sugar Changed the World, they examine how Crusaders brought sugar to Western Europe and how cultivating sugar led to the...

Crafting a clear and cohesive conclusion to any piece of writing is crucial. An effective conclusion restates the central claim in the introduction, briefly summarizes the supporting claims, and presents a new way of thinking about the...

How does an author's choice of artistic medium influence an audience? What about how an author chooses to transform original source material? These are the questions class members grapple with as they compare scenes from episode IV...

Class members compare the final 30 minutes of Lucas's Star Wars: A New Hope with Act V of Doescher's play, William Shakespeare's Star Wars: Verily, A New Hope and consider how the choice of media influences viewers' impression...

Language learners create and label the rooms in a house and then add and label images of objects that may be found in each room.

Poe goes high tech with a lesson plan 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...

Planning is the key to success. Scholars continue planning their essays by adding reasons to their Planning My Argument graphic organizers. Additionally, pupils analyze a body paragraph from a model position paper, identifying the...

After watching the documentary Dark Water about a traditional Chumash ceremony and reading a Chumash origin story, viewers are asked to create a coat of arms and to craft an essay that details a family tradition or their own origin story.

As the unit on research writing draws to a close, class members continue to revise and edit their papers, this time focusing on grammar, spelling, and punctuation (colon and semicolon).

Paul Langan's novel The Bully is the core text in a six-session unit plan that engages high schoolers in an in-depth examination of bullying and its effects on bullies, victims, and bystanders. The richly textured and carefully...

Is there power in persuasion? After reading paragraphs six and seven of Booker T. Washington's "Atlanta Compromise" speech, learners look at how Washington uses rhetoric and carefully planned word choice to add to the persuasiveness of...

Incorporate technology into a literature lesson with an innovative language arts lesson. Middle schoolers read an electronic version of original stories or fairy tales, and after determining the point of view, rewrite the tale from...

With the emphasis on incorporating more nonfiction in language arts classes the question arises about how to design activities that motivate kids to engage with informational text. How about an assignment that asks class members to...

Two lessons focus on making a beat. Using popular African American music of its time, scholars listen and analyze the rhythm then recreate it with hands drums, and cups. 

Ensure that your kids don't even consider saying "Not me!" when it comes time to read by engaging them in this set of lesson plans based around "The Little Red Hen." The class reads the story together before starting in on additional...