Students examine a variety of ways that families celebrate winter holidays. They complete a graphic organizer comparing Christmas, Hanukkah, and Kwanzaa, and write a five-sentence paragraph about one of the holidays discussed. Students...

Young scholars participate in a variety of shared reading and writing activities related to the book "The Big Sneeze" by Ruth Brown. They develop a list of farm vocabulary, sequence the events of the story on a graphic organizer, act out...

Young scholars discover how to apply the steps of the inquiry process through the study of bacteria. Working in groups of four, they cooperatively read an article about bacteria and complete a graphic organizer. Group members share with...

Plan on using Gone with the Wind as a reading selection? Here's a packet of prompts for activities and assessments.

How do you write an interesting beginning, middle, and end of a story? With this instructional activity, young writers look to other stories as examples. Then, they use some of the attached graphic organizers to help them create their...

Using a character map, learners assign traits to characters from Nicholasa Mohr’s El Bronx Remembered: A Novella and Stories. In addition, groups record evidence from the stories to justify the labels and use these sheets to prepare for...

In this KWL worksheet, students fill in this graphic organizer about what they know, what they think they will learn, and what they learned when done. Students fill in 3 spots for the graphic organizer.

Create a "Double Bubble" to organize information in a Venn diagram-like graphic organizer.   There are a few options included to differentiate this assignment, but unfortunately, there are no topics for selection. Provide your...

How do you read when you know you're going to be summarizing a text? Summarize a nonfiction text with your upper elementary schoolers. Your pupils independently read a nonfiction article and write a summary paragraph using the six-step...

Elementary readers in literature groups practice summarizing chapter-by-chapter with Roald Dahl's James and the Giant Peach. Focus on main idea, supporting details, and the 5 Ws. Unfortunately, a clever "peach" graphic organizer to which...

Here is a great lesson plan on recognizing events and themes in a story. Students read chapters from a chosen book and then fill out a graphic organizer to further explore the purpose of the chapter. They write the events, themes,...

Great for a reading intervention or remedial Language Arts class, this instructional activity uses two stories from Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul III ("Terri Jackson" and "Mary Lou" to reinforce note-taking skills, story elements,...

Young readers select a book from a provided list to use as the basis for an intensive class study of Holocaust novels. After completing their novels, groups create a multimedia presentation highlighting the elements of literature...

Students locate images of two things that fly on the Internet and print them. They develop graphic organizers to compare and contrast the two images and exhibit the images along with the organizers in a classroom gallery.

Learners discover how to use a digital camera and how to make a PowerPoint presentation. They practice good listening skills and hear how to make a "Supa Dupa Egg." They take notes and use them to create an effective, step-by-step...

Improve language skills by having your class read an article about Memorial Day. After reading, they respond to 6 matching questions, 29 fill-in-the-blank questions, 30 multiple-choice questions, 12 word-scramble questions, 30...

Get ready for state testing with this resource, which focuses on listening and writing skills. While a complete description of the writing assignment is provided here, the listening portion is not included. You could use the graphic...

Explore nonfiction writing by comparing and contrasting two different texts. After reading two nonfiction books, articles, or magazines, learners utilize a graphic organizer to record their similarities and differences. They answer study...

Originally designed to be used along with a text that is not included, this plan contains a graphic organizer and word guessing game to help readers use decoding strategies to gain new vocabulary. A set of questions relating to community...

Display U.S. and Canadian climate and vegetation through this text-companion worksheet. Learners read about the geography of these regions, take notes, and answer 3 comprehension questions as they read the selection. A graphic organizer...

Use the guiding questions on this page to fill out the two graphic organizers included in the materials tab. All of the materials focus on character or personality traits and ask pupils to find textual evidence of the traits they...

Remember reading "The Lottery" and "The Possibility of Evil" by Shirley Jackson? Learners can experience and analyze the tension, themes, and human experience found in these pieces through reading and class discussion. They use...