Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Teaching “Level of Difficulty” through Close Reading, Reflection, and Performance

For Teachers 9th - 12th
What makes a poem difficult? Explore that topic and more with your class as you work through the lesson plan detailed here. Using materials from Poetry Out Loud, a national recitation contest, individuals or small groups examine poems...
Lesson Plan
Facing History and Ourselves

After Charlottesville: Public Memory and the Contested Meaning of Monuments

For Teachers 9th - 12th
Are Civil War monuments a kind remembrance or a reminder of a dark past? The lesson plan focuses on the public's memory of the Civil War and the monuments that represent it. Young academics explore past efforts to change historical...
Lesson Plan
Prestwick House

Reading Challenge

For Students 9th - 12th
One of the big challenges of assigning independent reading is helping class members find a book to read. Another is encouraging readers to read a variety of genres. Never fear, help is here in the form of a quest that asks individuals to...
Lesson Plan
August House

The Contest Between the Sun and the Wind

For Teachers 2nd - 3rd Standards
Learn the moral of the story with a series of activities about Aesop's fables. Focusing on The Contest Between the Sun and the Wind, learners complete a graphic organizer to discuss who, what, how, and why the events occur. Additionally,...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Literacy Lesson: Guided Reading

For Teachers 1st - 3rd
Here is a wonderful lesson designed for young scholars with special needs. This well-thought-out lesson uses Big Books, familiar stories, and has a lot of review learning built into it. The book, The Keeping Quilt is used in the main...
Lesson Plan
Facing History and Ourselves

After Charlottesville: Contested History and the Fight against Bigotry

For Teachers 9th - 12th
History doesn't always reflect all sides. Academics discover how the remembered history of the Civil War differs for White and African Americans. The lesson explores how Civil War monuments and celebrations have racist connotations for...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Foreign Language Lip-Sync Karaoke Contest

For Teachers 6th - 12th
Teach your class about foreign language through transcribing lyrics. They will transcribe the lyrics of a song in a foreign language and use the lyrics to create a cloze activity as they listen and speak the language with their...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Contest Between the Sun and the Wind

For Teachers 1st
First graders read and explore the folktale, The Contest Between the Sun and the Wind. In this folktale lesson, 1st graders read the tale and describe the sun. There are several interdisciplinary extensions included: students illustrate...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Sentence Contest

For Teachers K - 2nd
Students review the definition of a sentence and identify the sentences (complete thoughts) from a list of possibilities. Students evaluate complete and incomplete sentences by being judges at a sentence contest.
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Radical Reads

For Teachers 6th - 12th
Students recreate an "American Idol" contest in which they present their favorite books to their classmates using arguments for and excerpts from the books. Following the presentation, students will be polled and the least popular books...
Lesson Plan
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Curated OER

Nutrition Label Scavenger Hunt

For Teachers Pre-K - 2nd
Students discover how to read nutrition labels. In this nutrition lesson, students review important vocabulary words, such as "sodium" and "calories." Students practice reading labels from various containers of food and participate in a...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Contest Between the Sun and the Wind

For Teachers Pre-K
Students listen to the story The Contest between the Sun and the Wind.  In this Sun and Wind story students answer comprehension questions and retell the story through role playing with character puppets.  Students create paper...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Circle of Gold: Guided Reading

For Teachers 3rd - 5th
Students participate in 8 guided reading sessions in which they read the novel, Circle of Gold, by Candy Dawson Boyd. They focus on and discuss characterization, synthesis, analysis, and predicting. They complete journal entries and...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Finish Reading Seedfolks

For Teachers 3rd - 4th
Young scholars identify the characteristics of a community. In this Seedfolks literature study lesson, the second in a unit, the teacher finishes reading the class Seedfolks and students answer comprehension questions and examine how...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Picture America's Sweetheart

For Teachers 9th - 12th
High schoolers examine Seventeen Magazine's America's Sweetheart contest and one of their finalists by reading about Sunia Arif and what made Seventeen choose her. Students then write a 300-word essay about what would make them or...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Do Heroes Have to Wear a Cape?

For Teachers 6th - 9th
Young writers choose a person from American history, their community, or their family to use as the subject of a persuasive essay. The process begins with a discussion of the characteristics of a hero, the completion of a prewriting web,...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Contest Between the Sun and the Wind

For Teachers K
Students investigate the relationship between the sun and wind.  In this reading comprehension lesson, students read the book The Contest Between the Sun and the Wind, and observe the effect of the Sun and wind on our planet....
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Contest Between The Sun And The Wind

For Teachers 2nd
Second graders read fables by Aesop and learn about the famous storyteller. In this fables lesson plan, 2nd graders discuss questions about Aesop and then write their own fable.
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Circle of Gold Guided Reading

For Teachers 2nd - 4th
Pupils participate in a variety of Guided Reading activities including comprehension questions, discussion, prediction, characterization and inferring meaning while they read Circle of Gold by Candy Dawson Boyd.
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The New Seven Wonders2

For Teachers 9th - Higher Ed
Students read and discuss the vocabulary related to a news article about the new version of the Seven Wonders of the world. They read the article, define key vocabulary terms, identify relative clauses from the article, and complete...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Sentence Contest

For Teachers K - 2nd
Young writers complete work with sentence structure. Theys go over the definition of a sentence before deciding whether given groups of words are sentences. They view and identify the sentences on a teacher made chart.
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Anansi and the Tug O' War

For Teachers 1st
Read a short book with your first graders! Anansi and the Tug O' War is the focus of this lesson. After reading the African story together, they complete language arts activities to practice reading comprehension. A stellar...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Learning Sight Words with Picture Me Reading and the Document Camera

For Teachers 1st
First graders identify sight words. In this learning sight words lesson, 1st graders view flash cards to practice the words and identify them in a poem. 
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Frankenstein

For Teachers 9th - 12th
Share a classic novel with your class using this resource. After reading Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, learners answer questions involving the narrator's point of view, make and confirm predictions, and sequence events in the story.