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A Picture Says a Thousand Words
Students create a writing selection with a well-developed plot. They use a personal photograph in which they are visible to base their autobiographical writing. They write a description of the events surrounding the photograph in the...
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Essential Narrative Concepts
Students interact with the main concepts of a narrative text in the six lessons of this unit. The setting, prediction, retelling, sequencing, and the identification of the beggining, middle and end of a story are investigated.
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Storytelling in the Oral Tradition
Seventh graders research Greek mythological characters. They write about problems faced by middle school-aged children and how the character would handle them. Students also create story boards to accompany their oral narratives.
National Endowment for the Humanities
Folklore in Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God
Learners define folklore, folk groups, tradition, and oral narrative. They identify traditional elements in Their Eyes Were Watching God Analyze and understand the role of traditional folkways and folk speech in the overall literary...
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Conflict Resolution in the World Today: Introduction to Current World conflicts, their Antecendents, the Progression, and their Potential Conclusions
Students write a paragraph describing a conflict they had with a friend or a family member and a paragraph explaining how it was resolved. In this social science lesson, students share their paragraphs with a partner and then will...
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It Was a Dark and Stormy Night
Using Alpha Smarts, 3rd graders write a "Story-in-the-Round". The end result of this project is one story for every student in the class that has been written by the entire class. Students create a PowerPoint presentation with a...
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Rock & Roll through Literary Terms: An Upbeat Lyrical Adventure
Students participate in a variety of activities surrounding Rock & Roll music, lyrics, drama and visual art and how they all help demonstrate examples of literary terms. They use Rock & Roll as an effective aid to stimulate their...
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Lesson: Nikhil Chopra: Performing Memory
Film imitates life; that's what they say. Using performance theory to tie the lesson together, learners attempt to understand memory and daily rituals as seen in art, film, and life. They read two chapters from the book, watch the...
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Letters From Rifka
Small groups read assigned chapters from the book, Letters to Rifka, then work together to fill out comprehension worksheets associated with their chapters. This fine, 13-page lesson culminates with each group getting together to meet...
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Lesson Plan 1: Introducing NaNo and Novels
Did you know that November is Novel Writing Month? In the first of a series of lessons, class members are introduced to the NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) project.
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Maroon Communities
Students examine political and religious factors that influenced English, Spanish, French, and Dutch colonization of the Americas, how slavery shaped social and economic life in the South after 1800, and elements of slavery during the...
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Writing a Children's Book -- Young Authors
Students practice their writing skills by creating a children's book. They integrate five elements of short stories into the narrative. They share their stories with their book buddies.
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Body Movement
Second graders interpret and transform drawn lines into locomotive movements. In this improvised movement lesson, 2nd graders draw a line on a piece of paper and use the elements of dance to interpret and transform their draw line into...
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Exploring American Tall Tales
Students explore elements of American folktales and tall tales. In this literature instructional activity, students read examples of American folktales and tall tales and prepare a monologue or news report to present to the class based...
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Animation
Studnets comprehend the elements of value, perspective and color schemes. They comprehend the principles of contrast, emphasis and unity, and the expressive qualities of thematic development and sequence. Students are asked about their...
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Oliver Twist Goes to Hollywood
How does Oliver Twist, the novel written by Charles Dickens, compare with its screenplay adaptation? Although the activity doesn't require learners to have read the novel, the similarities and differences of the highlighted passages...
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Collaborative Discussion: Common Core Basics for Back-to-School
Listening may be the most important skill of all for Common Core collaborative speaking standards. Prepare yourself for a class experience that boosts listening and speaking skills, with a great article. Attached lessons, excellent...
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Great Expectations: Group Writing
Examine the differences between totalitarianism and democracy in this writing lesson. Using the same format and theme from Great Expectations, young writers work in pairs to compose their own short stories. They follow guidelines for the...
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Writing a Mystery Story
Students examine the elements of mystery stories and read Rage in Harlem. In reciprocal teaching groups, they discuss the author's development of the story, and complete dialectical journals.
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Self-Assessment: Habits of Effective Readers, Writers, Speakers, Listeners, and Viewers
Fifth graders study how to read fluently. In this reading lesson, 5th graders practice reading and recording any miscues. Students time each other and graph their progress each day.
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Newspaper Poetry
Students cut out nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs from newspapers and create poems using words they have found.
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Posing for Rembrandt
Students consider the elements of costuming and posing in Rembrandt's work. They collect various costumes and experiment with poses in the theme of the painting "Night Watch". Students take photographs of poses and write accompanying...
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Three Part Dialogue
Eighth graders write a three part dialogue as part of an effective memoir. For this three part dialogue lesson, 8th graders are given two parts of a dialogue and emotions that accompany the words. Students then create...
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Literacy & Art: The Story behind the Quilt
Students examine the many ways quilts were used to chronicle the history and experiences of African slaves and African-Americans in America. They analyze a story quilt using the elements of storytelling, then create a class quilt.