¡Celebramos Kwanzaa! Celebrate Kwanzaa through the fictional story Celebra Kwanzaa con Botitas y sus gatitos to delightfully explain the seven principles of Kwanzaa. Dual language learners participate in reading and vocabulary...

A study of Alfred Noyes's poem "The Highwayman" opens a lesson about narrative poetry. Scholars read the poem and compare it to the animated video version using a worksheet. Learners look at models and use a template to craft an "I Am"...

Young writers generate descriptive words. They use pictures of various landscapes (from books, magazines, or the Internet) and complete a story pyramid. The pyramid (included here) asks to describe the main character, the setting, and...

Three lessons make up a unit on the birth of Canada. Learners in the third grade will analyze famous works of art, research historical events, and discuss the role women played in the early development of Canada. Writing, history, and...

Candy conversation hearts make writing a sweet pastime. Fifth graders write narratives demonstrating a complete thought and correct punctuation. The trick here is that they must use the words on five candy conversation hearts as part of...

Third graders explore respect. In this lesson about respecting others and their property, 3rd graders learn hoe to be nice to other people. Students discuss different situations and whether or not it is being respectful. Students write a...

Elementary writers practice writing descriptive paragraphs by adding adjectives and sensory words to their writing. They use a picture of a monster for their descriptive paragraph. This 12-page lesson should increase your charges...

Using this lesson on blogs, you can lead your class through the process of setting up a blog, writing a blog entry, editing their work, and more. There is a link to the blog site used, and attachments of blog entries.

Students write an autobiographical essay. In this writing lesson students read a narrative, Panic in Paris, and review the elements of a narrative as a class discussion. Well-known stories are used as examples for writing their own...

Students compose a creative writing piece based on a painting of a mythological scene. In this creative writing lesson plan,  students write about the scene in the painting and tie in  their original stories into tales from the...

Students create an ocean haiku. In this haiku activity, students use their five senses to write a haiku. Students watch videos about the ocean, make a sensory portrait, and create a class haiku.

Fourth graders write from the perspective of a child in the colonial period. In this writing lesson, 4th graders create a fictional character living in the colonial period and write about daily life from their perspective.

Second graders review the structure of a narrative piece of writing. Individually, they write a narrative based on their best day of school. After being read different stories, they share their own narratives with the class. They are...

Students work in groups to create a story that will be presented to the class.  In this story writing lesson, students complete a project planning sheet, work together to create a story that includes a hero and at least two other...

Groups of learners get together and are given copies of the state quarter reverses from the 2002 US Mint issue. Each pupil makes up a story that's based on the scene that appears on the reverse side of the quarter. The goal is for all...

Young thespians can try their hand at writing a script and acting out a scene, while gaining a deeper understanding of the universal topics presented in Shakespeare's wide array of plays. Begin the lesson by conducting a compare and...

After reading "The Senegalese Miracle" about the degree of sharing the author encounters upon arrival in Africa, class members read Mike Tidwell’s “Sharing in Africa” and compare the two stories. This cultural diversity lesson concludes...

Write dear old Peter Rabbit a letter with this lesson. First, youngsters listen to the story Peter Rabbit and analyze the story elements. Then they complete a story map graphic organizer in order to write a letter to Peter...

Here is a creative way to assess your geologists' grasp of the rock cycle: have them write and illustrate a children's book in which the main character journeys though his life, i.e. the rock cycle! A brief student instruction sheet and...

Your class can take turns describing a well know location or setting without giving its name, and the rest of the class can try to identify the location, based on the details given.  They chart the elements that helped in the...

Looking for a fresh approach to an end-of-unit project for The Odyssey? Check out a resource that has class members write their own hero's journey short story and then craft an illustration that depicts their tale. Apollonio di...

Check out this detailed resource for some beginning of the year activities. After examining examples, class members uses the computer lab to create a personal brochure enhanced with clip art or photos to introduce themselves to the...

One photograph can represent so much more than the images on the film. Eighth graders select a photograph from the Civil War era and conduct additional research based on the subject matter from the picture. Once they complete the...

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.