Curated OER
Speech! Speech!
Critical thinkers consider how word choice in speeches impacts the meaning and effectiveness of the message being presented. They examine and respond to some of the speeches made at the 2004 Republican and Democratic National Conventions.
Curated OER
Shaking the Movers: Youth Rights and Media
Children have rights! Exploring those rights and using media to express those rights is the focus of this Media Awareness Network lesson. Although some of the law links reflect the Canadian Articles of The Convention, the majority of the...
Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District
Parts of Speech Adverbs: Building Blocks of Grammar
What is the difference between an adjective and an adverb? Encourages scholars to explore the answer to this question while building a foundation of the English language. The lesson comes complete with an attention grabber, notes, and a...
Curated OER
Parts of a Friendly Letter
The art of writing a letter has not been lost to email and texting! Teach kids how to format a friendly letter with a presentation about the parts of a letter, as well as prompting them to write a letter about their favorite holiday.
National Endowment for the Humanities
Mark Twain and American Humor
“The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” is famous, in part, because it established a uniquely American form of humor. For this famous story, Mark Twain combines the tall-tale, the dialect story, and satire. Here is a resource...
Curated OER
Blogging
A fun, modern twist on journaling! Instead of responding to prompts in their composition notebook, writers use the Internet to complete blog entries. A sample blog (with prompts) is shown here, and writers are assessed on conventions and...
Curated OER
Classroom Capers: Creating a Magazine
Fourth graders build language skills in the context of creating a classroom magzine. They participate in activities which help students communitcate ideas and information for a variety of purposes and for specific audiences using the...
Curated OER
Managing Medical Conditions
Your scholoars practice organizing and presenting information through written language. They gather information about a medical condition and share it with someone else. They then use a format where they organize their information using...
Curated OER
A Sample Mini-lesson for Teaching Writing Conventions
Young scholars study writing conventions. In this writing conventions lesson plan, students study writing they have already completed and look for conventions they are already using without realizing. In a small group, young scholars...
Curated OER
Written and Oral English language conventions: Independent Practice
Sit or sat? Passed or past? Assess your pupils’ mastery of verb usage with 10 multiple choice questions. Learners must select the correct sentence from the listed four options.
Curated OER
Written and Oral English Language Conventions: Independent Practice
Sit/set, past/passed, except/accept, rise/raise, lie/lay. Are some of your pupils still misusing these verbs? Here are 10 multiple choice prompts that will provide them with extra practice. The learning exercise could be used in class or...
Curated OER
Can you Follow Me? Conventions
Use the present tense to create written assignments. Critical thinkers take a passage written in past or future tense and rewrite it in present tense. They then write a set of instructions in present tense.
Curated OER
It’s Your Birthday! – Conventions: Revision and Proofreading
Happy birthday! Celebrate everyone's birthday with this writing activity, which prompts seventh graders to research historical events in a country at the time of their birth to create an essay. Working in pairs, they proofread each...
Curated OER
Text as Object and Art: Aesthetic Impact on Audience Reception of Books in the Early Renaissance and Today
Tenth graders examine the role that aesthetics play in the publication of books. In groups, they apply the concept of physical affectation on each reader's experience to literature. They also compare and contrast the varied types of...
Curated OER
Commas: Conventional Usage
This four-page handout explains in detail when and why to use commas. Three extended sentences provide an opportunity for practice splitting long sentences into shorter ones. Multiple examples help to clarify correct usage.
Curated OER
Language Arts: Two Specific Documents
Students are able to read and analyze the essential parts of two specific types of documents, the informed consent document and the position paper, used by scientists to communicate information about their research to two different kinds...
Curated OER
Language Arts: Living in "The Matrix"
Pupils are able to identify, in a discussion mode, the ways in which the media uses persuasion to achieve their desired aims. They analyze, also in a discussion mode, the media's influence on our society by comparing media advertising...
Curated OER
Language Arts: Sentence Variety and Fluency
Students are able to identify, create, and evaluate three kinds of sentences: simple, compound, and complex. They are able identify the purpose of various sentence types: declarative, interrogative, imperative, exclamatory, and...
Curated OER
Language Arts: Revision and Peer Editing
Students are able to evaluate their peers' essays to determine clarity, completeness, and persuasiveness. They are able to revise their own essays for greater clarity and fluency, adding explanation where needed and cutting extraneous...
Curated OER
Punctuation Review/Tic-tac-toe
Sixth graders play a tic-tac-toe game in pairs. In this language arts lesson, one student uses an X to show the correct sentences, while the other student uses an O to show incorrect sentences. Students use a T-chart to record the...
Curated OER
Writing Conventions: Capitalization and Punctuation
Learners read the sentences, circle the first letter, and draw a line under the punctuation for the seven sentences.
Curated OER
Writing Conventions: Punctuation
First and second graders read the sentences and choose what type of sentence it is based on the punctuation.
Curated OER
Writing Conventions: Sentence Completion
Young scholars write the naming part or the subject for the five sentences. They use the subjects in the word bank.
School City of Hobart
Too Many Types Of Titles
Direct instruction on punctuation rules for titles is followed by collaborative practice in class. Two worksheets with aesthetically engaging graphic design provide practice. For 12 examples, small groups either underline, italicize, or...