Curated OER
"Aaaaaa!!!!" It's Okay, Baby!!
Your kindergarten or first grade class works on recognizing the /a/ sound in spoken words. Use the fun tongue twister to help remember the target sound, and practice writing the letter a. Then have them write words that use this target...
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Classifying Information About a Main Idea
Elementary learners explore language arts by completing a text identification activity. They discuss the importance of a main idea in a story or paper and how to present it properly. Then they practice identifying the main idea in sample...
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Shorten the Length
Learn how to summarize by identifying main ideas and supporting details. Readers cross out unimportant information as they read through a text. Is it a random detail? Cross it out! They then draw a concept map, placing the main idea in...
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Summarizing: James and the Giant Peach
Text marking and a T-chart format to distinguish important information from trivia help elementary readers summarize effectively. Encouraging readers to construct a chapter summary from paragraph-level topic sentences is another sound...
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The Tug Says Uhh!
Kindergarteners and first graders discover the /u/ sound! After practicing making the sound with the funny tongue twister, youngsters use their Elkonin letterboxes to divide a set of words into their phonemes. Then pairs read Bud...
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The 5 W's
Examine how to answer who, what, when, where, and why when reading text. Young writers listen to the story Skeleton Hiccups, and as a class answer and discuss the five W's. Independently they read the story silently, and write the...
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Main Idea
What could you pack for a trip if you don't know the destination? After writing a list of items they would want to bring, fourth graders learn that the "trip" is to the South Pole - revealing the need to understand all available...
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U.S. and Canada: How are We the Same? How are We Different?
Get high school geographers to compare and contrast Canada and the United States. They begin by drawing a freehand map of North America, then complete readings to gain insight into Canada. The text is not provided; however, another text...
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Hide and Seek Vocabulary!
Third graders practice word recognition and vocabulary building. They find word cards in the classroom. Then they practice reading the words and using them in sentences. Additional practice is gained by writing the words and using them...
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Converting Fractions, Decimals, and Percents
Prime or review the steps needed to convert fractions, decimals, and percents. Each slide contains very basic rules of conversion and a few examples of each. The content of this resource is good, but the layout of the text could be better.
Curated OER
Spider "How To" Make a Spider
Young chefs follow the set-by-step instructions of a recipe and use their prior knowledge of the body parts of a spider to make edible spider cookies. After completing a pre-writing graphic organizer they then write a "how to"...
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Food Labels in the Classroom
Students study the nutritional information on food labels and become familiar with the basic dietary needs of the human body. They write letters to food companies.
Anti-Defamation League
Challenging Gender Role Stereotypes
Through thoughtful discussion and a read-aloud, scholars challenge gender role stereotypes. Pupils examine pictures and collaborate with their small groups to debunk stereotypes. They explain what gender role stereotypes they know of and...
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Learning From World War II and Connecting It to the Present
Compare and contrast World War II to the modern Iraq war with this instructional activity. After watching a film, learners use supporting evidence to support their point of view of the conflicts. Using the internet, they create a...
Serendip
Understanding How Genes Are Inherited via Meiosis and Fertilization
Bring the excitement of genetics to scholars with a dynamic hands-on meiosis modeling experience. During the activity, biologists follow step-by-step procedures to build chromosomes, model independent assortment, learn about crossing...
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Examining Ways to Organize Questions and Answers Within a Text
Pupils study questions and answers within a text to learn about writing structure and organization. In this writing structure lesson, students investigate books in class by asking questions for the text. Pupils then format their own...
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Commercials/Ads
Students write a persuasive commercial and advertisement. In this commercial instructional activity, students write a 20 second commercial that persuades people and shares the most important aspects of the company. They evaluate...
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Drawing Conclusions
Students view images and draw conclusions based on what they see happening in the pictures. In this drawing conclusions lesson plan, students also write a paragraph and their classmates have to draw a conclusion based on their writing.
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Short and Sweet
Students examine how to summarize information from expository text. They read an expository text and identify the important information from the reading. Students identify the topic sentence and write their own topic sentences.
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Perspective
Students explore the writing trait of voice. In this writing skills lesson plan, students read No, David! and discuss the author's use of voice. Students write a class version of the story called Yes, David! that incorporates an...
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How To Use The Spell Check
Students use their editing techniques and use the spell check on their computers using writing techniques and any word processing programs. Then they type the paragraph found on the accompanying sheet full of mistakes. Students also go...
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What's the Big Idea?
Students choose a paragraph from a book of their choice, identify the main idea, and draw an illustration of the main idea. They write original paragraphs, illustrate them, and trade with a partner, identifying the main idea of the...
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Learning About Hurricanes
Learners write a research paper on hurricanes. For this weather lesson, students use a science text book to write down facts about hurricanes on note cards and then outline their essay. Learners use the outline to create an organized essay.
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Characters in Nathaniel Hawthorne's Stories
Learners read literature by Nathaniel Hawthorne and write an essay comparing the main characters in the two stories. In this character analysis lesson, students read the stories Young Goodman Brown and The Minister's Black Veil. Learners...