West Side Story, the modern retelling of William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, won ten Academy Awards for its rousing depiction of the tale of star-crossed lovers. But how closely does the plot align to its source material? Compare and...

How do you graph a sentence? Scholars do just that as they represent relationships between independent and dependent variables with a graphical representation. Given a sentence, they determine the pertinent relationship and create a...

A chiminea is an outdoor fireplace usually made from terracotta. Your class will make miniature versions of this useful heating device to practice specific sculpting techniques. This lesson spans four days. It includes vocabulary...

Budding artists study the history and significance behind ancient mosaics and mosaic murals. They study multiple examples of ancient mosaics, sketch a design, and use clay tiles to create thoughtful mosaics of their own. 

Learners develop fantasy creatures and characters, describing personalities in terms of gestures, actions, and expressions displayed. Then they make fantasy masks, focusing on shape, form, proportion, line, and emphasis to demonstrate...

After reading and describing the characters, setting, and plot in The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, class members write original Island Adventure narrative pieces including detailed descriptions of people, places, and things. Afterward,...

Based on the alliterative book Rosie's Roses by Pamela Duncan Edwards, here is a resource to reinforce phonics and alliteration for younger readers. Several suggested activities would easily adapt to other books. Sparse procedural details.

Extensive notes on foundational chemistry concepts make up this resource. It summarizes the properties of matter, the periodic table, chemical nomenclature, and general chemical bonding. Design a set reading comprehension questions to go...

Who doesn't love music? Poems and songs will engage your high school class in a discussion about irony. Use songs like "Rockin' in the Free World" or "Born in the U.S.A." to illustrate the ironic point of view. Print the lyrics so...

What are hyperboles? Examine the attributes of hyperboles with your high school classes. Pupils read selected poems and prose selections that feature hyperboles and discuss their functions in each work of literature. Specific poems and...

Colorful contemporary images contained in a PowerPoint presentation will capture the attention of class members and model for them the how to distinguish between the subject and the theme of a work. A great want to introduce this...

How do human habitats compare to animal habitats? Individuals begin their nature discovery by drawing their own habitats that extend beyond their houses. Pupils ensure their drawings include the four habitat elements of food, water,...

This slide show on figures of speech includes definitions, images, and examples from real texts for several common terms: metaphor, simile, personification, alliteration, irony, hyperbole, onomatopoeia, and imagery. The presentation is...

Class members examine depictions of Thanksgiving in various mediums and discuss how point of view influences the composition and presentation of the work. While the focus here is on important events in American history as seen from the...

Your scholars will be hooked after reading the cryptic narrative poem "The Listeners." They explain why it is so mysterious, then use the poem to learn about pronouns. Learners read an excerpt from the poem that has been altered to...

“Desire + Danger = Tension.” Thus begins a PowerPoint that details how to create tension and maintain the reader’s interest in a story. Although text-heavy, the color-coded slides model how the D + D = T formula functions and the...

Get some giggles from your class and build understanding of the mood of a literary piece with this printable. Pupils fill in the mood in the gem part of the ring, and write down supporting details below (inside of the actual ring). While...

Test understanding of "The Inn of Lost Time" by Lensey Namoika with an assessment that includes true/false, multiple choice, vocabulary, short answer, and essay questions. The test is not entirely traditional since, for the first 10...

Acronyms can help learners remember facts and analyze poetry. This resource includes graphic organizers for TP-CASTT, SOAPS, SOAPSTone, and DIDLS. Class members can try out one or all of these strategies to assist with that difficult job...

Engage young learners in expanding their vocabulary with a fun game. Scholars learn how compound words provide clues about the meaning of unfamiliar vocabulary. Pairs take turns reading a definition, locating its corresponding compound...

Young readers learn how to get at the root of new vocabulary with this fun language arts activity. When working in pairs, children begin by matching unknown vocabulary words to their Greek or Latin roots. When all the vocabulary cards...

Scholars learn to find meaning in words using affixes with a language arts activity. In pairs, children sort cards with printed sentences that include words with the prefixes mis- and pre- and the suffixes -er, -ness, and -able. Then,...

Young readers get to the root of unfamiliar vocabulary with a collaborative learning activity. Given a deck of root word cards and copies of a graphic organizer, pairs of students take turns flipping over cards and brainstorming...

In pairs, scholars draw cards, read the word, and identify its root. Learners place the card on a tree-themed worksheet to sort words by their roots.