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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Creative Writing Story Boards

For Teachers 7th - 12th
Students design their own memorable three-D book with rubbings for illustrations. They draft and edit an original story and then choose which characters or scenes they want to illustrate. Each student also shares their art and writing...
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Lesson Plan
3
3
Curated OER

Writing Short Stories: The Fun Way

For Teachers 7th - 9th Standards
Do your young authors suffer from writer's block when they try to write short stories? Access their natural creativity with C-Gor, the writing monster! The instructional activity takes aspiring authors through a new writing process...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Scrambled Stories II

For Teachers 4th - 8th
Review story elements with your class. They will use examples from a story to develop critical-thinking questions. Then they use a graphic organizer to describe the setting, character, and plot of the story, focusing on how they...
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Worksheet
Curated OER

A Fantasy Story: Baby Bear's Space Journey

For Students K - 1st Standards
Give this literacy worksheet to your beginning readers to help them draw out key details and retell in their own words. They read a short fantasy story about a bear in space which includes dialogue, onomatopoeia, and a simple story line....
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Printables
PreKinders

Duck in the Truck Flannel Board Set

For Teachers Pre-K - K
If you're reading Jez Alborough's Duck in the Truck, use these cute felt pieces to act out the story. The set features a duck, several animals, a truck, a rock, and a boat.
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Learning Network: Re-envisioning Classic Stories

For Teachers 5th - 8th
Readers reflect on enjoyable stories they know, brainstorm criteria that make a story "good," analyze a New York Times article about innovative children's performances, re-envision classics on their own, and peer edit drafts. Use this as...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Walk Two Moons: Hook and Concept of a Frame Story

For Teachers 6th - 8th Standards
As an introduction to Sharon Creexh's Walk Two Moons, a volunteer dons a pair of boots and walks about the classroom.Observers then ponder the axiom, Don't judge a man until you've walked two moons in his moccasins. Their collaborative...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Story Problems

For Teachers 3rd - 5th
Youngsters learn how to solve story problems. They  listen to story problems, learn how to identify important information in a problem, and observe how to solve a story problem. Pupils practice solving an addition story problem with a...
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Writing
Scholastic

Story Starters for "Many Beginnings"

For Teachers 3rd - 9th
An alien at dinner? An eerie train whistle? A parent trying to be hip? Get your creative writers going with a list of story starters.
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Plot of a Short Story (SMART Board)

For Teachers 8th
Help your pupils track the plot of a short story with this SMART Board activity. Using the short story "The Dinner Party" by Mona Gardner (though the lesson would work with any other short story), they define the exposition, rising...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Elements of a Short Story (SMARTboard)

For Teachers 7th - 8th
TV for homework? Your pupils' dreams have come true! After reading Sandra Cisneros's "Eleven," they analyze the elements of the story, particularly the plot and and climax. The lesson could work with any short story that you are using to...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Scrambled Stories

For Teachers 6th - 9th
Character development, setting, and plot? Sounds like the makings of a good narrative story. Young authors read and analyze several narrative examples, and then they use what they know to pen an original composition. They work both in...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Telling a Story

For Teachers 7th - Higher Ed
Do your class members complain they don’t know what to write about? Give them disposable cameras and ask them to take pictures of 12 things that make them happy. After the pictures are developed, they are pasted on a poster board and...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

What Is the True Story of the Three Little Pigs?

For Teachers 1st - 4th
Cozy up and listen to a recording of The True Story of the Three Little Pigs and The Three Little Javelinas. Then, lead your class in a compare and contrast of the two stories by creating a Venn diagram.
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Elements of a Short Story (SMART Board)

For Teachers 7th
Seventh graders view a PowerPoint presentation about short story elements. They complete a plot diagram using a previously read short story. Students brainstorm events in the story. They discuss the difference between major and less...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Story Totems

For Teachers 9th - 12th
Students write and illustrate a story to describe the habitat and life cycle of a selected animal. They write and publish their story, and create a picture of the animal on a wooden board.
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Easter Story

For Teachers 3rd
After hearing the Passion, Jesus' suffering, death and resurrection, through an account of the gospel writer St. Mark students will comprehend the saving story of our Christian faith. They comprehend their language skills by writing and...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Story Boards

For Teachers 3rd - 5th
Pupils devise story boards to sequence the main events in a story. They draw a picture that demonstrates the main event in each chapter of a story and label it with a sentence.
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Introduce Vocabulary: Our Family Tree: An Evolution Story (Peters)

For Teachers K - 3rd
Lisa Peters presents macroevolution as a large-scale family tree in her book Our Family Tree: An Evolution Story. She suggests the process from single-celled organisms to modern-day humans, and learners explore new vocabulary through the...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Introduce Vocabulary: Owen and Mzee: The True Story of a Remarkable Friendship (Hatkoff & Kahumbu)

For Teachers K - 3rd
The heartfelt true story of Owen the hippopotamus and Mzee the 133-year-old tortoise will have budding readers engaged as they practice vocabulary in the context of Isabella Hatkoff's nonfiction story. Although you could include more,...
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Lesson Plan
National Endowment for the Humanities

A Wrinkle in Time: The Board Game

For Teachers 5th - 8th Standards
Tackle some big questions about A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle with a board game project. As learners brainstorm for and complete their board games, they consider what helps and hinders Meg on her journey and why she succeeds in...
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Lesson Planet Article
Curated OER

Instill a Passion for Writing Short Stories

For Teachers 3rd - 6th
Quick writing tips and tricks to guide and polish learners' narrative writing.
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Cartoon Stories

For Teachers 2nd - 8th
All ages love to engage in cartoon writing –- little do they know that they actually learn quite a bit from it! In an instructional session focused on literacy syntax and vocabulary, your pupils work cooperatively to draw six pictures...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Introduce Vocabulary: Hot Air: The (Mostly) True Story of the First Hot-Air Balloon Ride (Priceman)

For Teachers K - 3rd
What a fun way to explore new vocabulary words! Marjorie Priceman's book Hot Air: The (Mostly) True Story of the First Hot-Air Balloon Ride offers plenty of new words for scholars to learn in context: amateur, assembled, demonstration,...