High schoolers explore ancestry and immigration. In this Canadian immigration lesson, students interview their family members to identify their cultural history. They compose an essay that compares Filipino immigration stories to those...

Learn about animal habitats, characteristics, and writing in a different perspective. The class composes a narrative from the perspective of a fresh water animal, they include a problem and the animal's reaction to the problem. The...

Use your class's knowledge of pollution and water treatment to write an editorial to town citizens. They apply prior knowledge in order to compose a letter intended for newspaper publication, focusing on writing to an appropriate audience.

Collective story writing is a great way to reinforce the concept of story elements and collaborative learning. Young writers discuss story elements such as, setting, character, action, climax, conclusion, foreshadowing, dialogue, and...

  Did you know that 50% of all Americans can trace a relative who traveled through Ellis Island? Relive these journeys with your class and then provide sentence strategy templates for them to use to compose their own informative...

Investigate the techniques used in a persuasive argument. Young writers compose a persuasive argument persuading their principal to take their class on a trip to the location of their choice. They then create a persuasive web site.

Define vocabulary related to global waste. Creative thinkers review and illustrate terms for the Global Garbage Picture Dictionary. They play a vocabulary game in which co-operative skills among players in encouraged. A great way to...

Topping the page is a chart of crystal size and mineral composition of several different igneous rocks. Geology whizzes answer five multiple choice questions after analyzing the information in the chart. This is a simple, but sufficient...

What do families around the world have in common? Explore this theme through the popular animated film My Neighbor Totoro by Hayao Miyazaki. Over the course of two days, pupils view the film, pausing to discuss their own families and the...

Engage your class in art analysis of Indian Look-Alike by Melanie Yazzie. Using this work of art as inspiration, writers compose a poem or short story. After a peer review session, the teacher conveys information about the work of art as...

Encourage your pupils to support their claims with textual evidence, whether is is from literary texts or informational texts. You might use the assignment example, which suggests an assignment on what it's like to be an immigrant in...

In order to support an idea, writers must use evidence. Your class members can prepare their evidence with this basic worksheet. Writers note down the topic they are learning about and their own idea. Next, they come up with information...

To better understand how to compose a clear and well-organized paper, learners read short passages, write summaries, and make colored graphic organizers. This is a fully developed three-day lesson with suggested assessments.

This discussion based lesson focuses on the sensitive topic of suicide attacks or bombings used throughout history during times of militaristic upheaval. Learners read news stories, compose journal entries, and engage in a class...

Fifth graders visit the playground to look for signs of life. They search for insects, birds, animal tracks, feathers, nests, trees, soil, etc. They then compose a class list that shows all findings in the schoolyard and post it in the...

Have your learners play around with Shakespeare's language. In this plan, small groups examine and rearrange soliloquies from Othello, noting how the language changes and morphs. All groups have a chance to change each soliloquy, making...

Reinforce the importance of the writing process with this publication lesson. Elementary and middle schoolers compose a parts of speech book which includes one page each for nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions,...

Groups become experts in one aspect of the six traits of writing, prepare a PowerPoint presentation, jigsaw, and teach others about their trait. Writers then focus on these traits as they compose a persuasive essay about a person they...

Help create confident and competent Internet users for research purposes. Middle schoolers conduct Internet research and compose a paper on the computer. They learn how to properly cite Internet references and explore net etiquette.

Your middle schoolers can become stronger writers with a lesson covering the basics. They compose effective thesis statements and introductions, discuss different ways to capture a reader's attention, and compare a poorly written...

Explore basic paragraphs. Young writers compose a topic sentence, supporting sentences, and a concluding sentence. This lesson is intended for use with a SMART Board, a software technology web link is induced. 

Practice reading comprehension by approaching oceanography through 2 pages of informational text. The text compares the ocean floor to the Grand Canyon to gives students perspective, and gives a brief coverage of the earth's crust and...

High schoolers write about the impact of the Underground Railroad. They examine primary documents as they conduct independent research to explore the role of the Underground Railroad during the fight for abolition. They...

Six slides summarize the details about group 14 in the periodic table, otherwise known as the carbon group. Young chemists will see facts about carbon itself, and then some general uses of related metalloids. This is a short and basic...