A lesson plan instills the importance of locating reliable sources. Scholars are challenged to locate digital sources, analyze their reliability, search for any bias, and identify frequently found problems that make a source unusable. 

Encourage scholars to express themselves with help from an engaging song. Sung to the tune of "London Bridge is Falling Down," participants sing phrases that offer tips for dealing with emotions—sad, happy, worried, proud, mad, and...

Timothy Steele's poem, "Toward the Winter Solstice," offers scholars an opportunity to consider what poets and scientists could learn from each other's work. First, learners examine a NASA image of a star-forming region in the Orion...

Should Juneteenth be recognized as a national holiday? To prepare to take a stance on this question, young historians first analyze the Emancipation Proclamation and compare it to Lincoln's first Inaugural Address. Scholars then read an...

Create a little harmony with Amani Project! Young musicians create their instruments using found or recycled objects. As an introduction, class members first experiment with sounds they can make with their bodies (clapping, stomping...

Is Antigone relevant to today's readers? After reading Sophocles' tragedy, scholars must decide if the themes are universal and timeless. Class members engage in a series of activities designed to have them closely consider the...

The takeaway from the "Playing by the Rules" lesson is that it is each person's responsibility to learn the rules in a given situation and that they must accept the consequences if they choose not to follow the stated rules. Class...

Has any progress been made in desegregating schools since 1954's Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education? To find out, class members examine charts and graphs representing U.S. schools' racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic...

Make learning the definitions of literary terms memorable with a fun and engaging activity. Teams of scholars are given several terms and create an acrostic poem with simplified definitions and examples.

Scholars complete a KWL chart to indicate what they know about Cesar Chavez and then research what they want to know about this farm worker, labor leader, and civil rights activist. To complete the lesson, scholars research modern civil...

Why do people engage in cyberbullying? What can be done about it? These are the questions middle schoolers consider in a very timely lesson. Participants view PSA announcements, read a case study, and participate in scenarios designed to...

Introduce high school freshmen to the characteristics of informative writing with a 5-day lesson that distinguishes informative writing from other modes. Scholars learn how to search for and cite reliable resources, then research and...

Learning how to craft a cogent argument based on a solid claim, supported with evidence and solid reasoning, is an important life skill. Teach middle schoolers about argumentative writing with a lesson asking them to analyze the claims,...

Who were they? High school freshmen brush up on their research skills by investigating an important person in American history. They select a name, fill out a KWHL chart, and research why their person is important. Scholars then complete...

Words carry weight. And some words carry baggage. Scholars learn the difference in a study of connotation and denotation. Individuals sort the cards into three groupings using words from Shakespeare's play. After sharing within groups,...

The Modern Language Association (MLA) Style Sheet is about giving credit where credit is due. And while there are different style sheets, the one most often used in Language Arts is the MLA. In this lesson plan, high school scholars...

"Yuns betta outten the lights!" Colloquial language is the focus of a instructional activity that asks middle schoolers to consider the pros and cons of using idioms. They read articles, match expressions with their meaning and place of...

Remember when everything was Fantastic! Fabulous! Awesome! Iconic! A series of activities encourages young writers to move beyond these overused descriptors and instead choose a more precise language.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech provides the text for a lesson plan that introduces scholars to the significance of syntax. After examining several types of clauses, phrases, and structures, class members use the...

Lines from popular songs are used to teach middle schoolers about conditional and subjunctive moods. Groups engage in a card sort activity to identify conditional and subjective sentences and then partners draft sentences of each type....

If, then, Else is not only a basic programming language command, it is also the basis for conditional statements used in writing. Middle schoolers try to craft conditional statements with a card sort activity and then collaborate on a...

Walt Whitman's poem "A Noiseless Patient Spider" provides high schoolers an opportunity to reflect on the importance of perseverance and fortitude. After drafting a Quick Write about a time they tried and tried again to accomplish...

An interactive resource introduces users to dictionaries, glossaries, and thesauri and the significant differences among these reference guides. Users learn which reference is best for which kind of search, examine sample entries from...

Eleventh graders recognize some of the causes and effects of the Great Depression, and thereby explain the motives behind Roosevelt's "New Deal" program for the United States.