Curated OER
Developing Reading Comprehension
Developing reading comprehension is an ongoing process that begins the moment a child becomes engaged with literature. From learning the skills to navigate a picture book to reading an assigned chapter in a chemistry text, good readers...
Curated OER
Reading for Information
What should readers do to prepare for reading an informational text? What should they do during their reading? What should they do after completing such a text? Introduce your pupils to reading strategies and techniques to gain meaning...
Washington Township Public Schools
Using Paired Text
Paired reading passages frequently appear on standardized exams, but finding text sets to use in the classroom is sometimes a challenge. A lesson plan on using paired texts includes a selection of passages and a graphic organizer for...
Curated OER
Man's Search for Meaning: Vocabulary Strategy
Readers of Man's Search for Meaning use context clues, create stories using words from the text, and retype these stories as part of their vocabulary study of Viktor Frankl's book.
EngageNY
Mid-Unit Assessment, Part 2: Analyzing an Excerpt from the Narrative
Writing is a craft. Scholars take a mid-unit assessment where they answer questions about the author's purpose and craft in Douglass's narrative. After completing the assessment, pupils look continue with their independent reading text.
Florida Center for Reading Research
Vocabulary: Word Meaning, Word Web
Explore the multiple meanings of common homographs with this fun language arts activity. Given a series of word webs and a pile of definition cards, pupils complete each web by matching four different definitions to each target word.
Ontario
Reading Graphic Text
Do learners really need to be taught how to read cartoons, comic books, and comic strips? Yes. Just as they need to learn how to read other forms of graphic text such as diagrams, photos, timetables, maps, charts, and tables. Young...
Ontario
Reading Informational Text
Learning to recognize the importance of the features of information text (i.e., titles, subtitles, endnotes, sidebars, etc.) is the focus of a reading activity designed for middle schoolers. Learners examine how these text features help...
Nancy N. Boyles
Summary Frame for Story Text and Informational Text
Provide these templates as aids for pupils as they work to compose summaries of both stories and informational texts. The first two frames provide sentence starters to help learners structure their summaries and include all the necessary...
Statistics Education Web
Who Sends the Most Text Messages?
The way you use statistics can tell different stories about the same set of data. Here, learners use sets of data to determine which person sends the most text messages. They use random sampling to collect their data and calculate a...
Curated OER
Determining Author's Point of View: The Sneeches
Determine the author's point of view in a text. Young readers read Dr. Seuss' The Sneeches and identify the author's purpose in the story. They identify persuasive techniques in writing, asking and answering questions to better...
Curated OER
Short But Sweet
After analyzing and evaluating news summaries found in the New York Times "Week in Review" section, middle schoolers study the steps for summarizing a news article briefly and accurately. They write two news summaries: one on a newspaper...
Curated OER
Cooperative Classroom Text Features Activities
Fifth graders examine text features and create a PowerPoint presentation. In this text features lesson, 5th graders go over Kagan Cooperative Learning Structures and text features before they choose one to include in a book and...
Norwich University
Seven Man-Made Engineering Wonders of the Ancient World
Imagine precisely cutting and then moving a 120 ton boulder more than two miles without mechanical cutting tolls, skid loaders, or hydraulic cranes. Imagine carving a stone figure that includes a drainage system that permits rainwater to...
Curated OER
Persuasion as Text: Organizational, Grammatical, and Lexical Moves in Barbara Jordan’s "All Together Now"
A thorough activity on persuasive writing takes middle schoolers through several activities, including group discussion, collaborative posters, and independent writing. They compare historical speeches and analyze the persuasive...
Curated OER
Alphabet Poems
Develop fluency with a variety of works. Help kindergartners use multiple strategies to understand text and decoding. They will create an alphabet poem book on Kid Works 2 to illustrate and write their own poem. In the end, they will...
Hawaiʻi State Department of Education
Illustrating Text
Ideas like this are highly effective for helping build better reading comprehension. The class listens to an excerpt from a grade-appropriate text, and they discuss what clues or words helped them visualize the scene. They then read a...
Curated OER
Creating and Using a Checklist of Performance Techniques to Critique and Find the "Message" in Mass Media Performances
Students analyze and critique theater events by evaluating and constructing meanings from improvised and scripted scenes and from theater, film, television, and electronic media productions.
Curated OER
Book: What the Land Means to Americans
Students, after reading Chapter One in the book, "What the Land Means to Americans," research from a variety of resources Tlingit totem poles. After their extensive research, they create a totem pole to present to their peers to...
Reed Novel Studies
From The Mixed Up Files Of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler: Novel Study
Claudia Kincaid decides to run away to bring some excitement to her life, but she never expects the adventure she finds. A helpful study guide takes readers through the novel From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler....
Reed Novel Studies
Escape From Mr. Lemoncello's Library: Novel Study
Comparing yourself to others is a sure way to make you feel worse about yourself. Kyle, a character in Escape From Mr. Lemoncello's Library, knows this well, as it is difficult for him to compete with his older brothers. Will he finally...
Curated OER
Picture This
A unique writing instructional activity, this plan begins with learners talking about multiculturalism in small groups. Each learner will choose a picture from a newspaper, describe it to their small group, and think about how it relates...
California Education Partners
Bud Not Buddy
A two-day assessment challenges scholars to read an excerpt from the story, Bud Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis then complete a series of exercises in preparation for a writing assignment. Day one includes an independent reading...
Curated OER
Interpreting Meaning in Maya Angelou’s “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings”
Launch a study of Maya Angelou's "I know Why the Caged Bird Sings" with the Youtube video of Alicia Keys singing her "Caged Bird." Groups then read Angelou's poem and discuss the symbols employed. Although the text of the poem is not...