Eighth graders create a kaleidoscope drawing. They show the basic art rules (shading, highlighting, coloring, etc.) They increase their design and drawing skills, improve hand eye coordination and develop an understanding of mirror images.

If you need a lesson for your poetry unit, use two poems by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow ("Rain in Summer" and "The Slave in the Dismal Swamp") and a resource on Elements of Poetry. The lesson plan guides you through activities...

Encourage class members to add expression and put themselves back in time during the Civil War with a reader's theater activity. The scripts include dialogue on what it was like for the Union and Confederate sides during this time.

Explore the measures of central tendency through a challenging task. Given values for the mean, median, mode, and range, collaborative groups create a set of data that would produce those values. They then critique other answers and...

Explore the effect of outliers through an analysis of mean, median, and standard deviation. Your classes examine and compare these measures for two groups. They must make sense of a group that has a higher mean but lower median compared...

Discover relationships between linear and nonlinear functions. Initially, a set of data seems linear, but upon further exploration, pupils realize the data can model an infinite number of functions. Scholars use multiple representations...

Model geometric concepts through a hands-on approach. Learners apply similar triangle relationships to solve for an unknown side length. Before they find the solution, they describe the transformation to help identify corresponding sides.

Teach solving absolute value inequalities through inquiry. Groups use their knowledge of absolute value and solving inequalities to find a solution set to an absolute value inequality. Working collaboratively encourages discussion,...

Full truth, or an exaggeration? How can you tell when a storyteller is exaggerating a story? Readers analyze a story told by Hortensia, and identify the exaggerative language she uses. Then, learners write their own narrative story using...

Readers' theater is a fun way to get kids reading with expression and improve their fluency! There is a full script here for The Three Bears with five characters to assign.

Looking for some additional materials for Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart"? Included in a 14-page packet are an anticipation guide, a vocabulary list, exercise, and quiz, a list of literary terms, and an essay assignment with pre-writing...

Designed for teachers, this 12-page packet uses passages from Guy de Maupassant's "The Necklace" to model how to design activities that encourage close reading of complex text.

The US Constitution is the beginning of Americans' rights. Use a five-paragraph passage to give a brief history of the US Constitution. A great last minute addition to a lesson on Constitution Day.

If you knew people would pay extra for a bald dragon, could you pick which parents you should breed in order to get the highest number? The unit examines heredity and genetics through breeding dragons, mice, dogs, and tries to figure...

You won't have to force your classes to complete these engaging activities! Through exploration, young scientists learn that force has both magnitude and direction. They draw force diagrams, investigate force models, and complete a...

Valleys, mountains, and plateaus are just a few geographic landforms on our Earth. Read about these types and more in a brief landform passage. After reading, learners respond to six short answer comprehension questions.

"Dun dun... dun dun." A shark! After second graders read a four-paragraph passage about sharks, they respond to four reading comprehension questions that use the text as a basis for the answers.

Learners read about the objects we see in our night and day skies before answering five short answer comprehension questions.

Dig into a classic math problem with your classes. Through an engaging task, learners work with rate and distance information to make conclusions. In the task, two people walk at different rates; one leaves first, and scholars...

It seems the post office has run out of stamps! Learners build all the values of postage available if the post office only sells five- and seven-cent stamps. The task provides an opportunity to create an expression in two variables and...

Hail to the Chief! Your class learns about Abraham Lincoln winning presidency and choosing cabinet advisors through a reading passage and paired multiple choice questions. The resource offers great practice for state tests and...

Abraham Lincoln abolished slavery and led the Union out of the most tumultuous time in American history. An informative passage and paired questions evaluate learners' understanding of main ideas, supporting points, and domain-specific...

How do you bring a nation back together after there is civil war? Readers learn how the United States Civil War concluded with a passage focused on the latter part of Abraham Lincoln's presidency. Multiple choice questions check pupils'...

Fort Sumter, the site of the Civil War's first battle, taught the Union and the Confederacy an important lesson: they would both need to take stronger steps than anticipated if they wanted to win the war. History pupils read about the...