Curated OER
Nina Bonita: Culture and Beauty
Students read Nina Bonita by Ana Maria Machado. In this reading comprehension/ geography lesson, students recall various parts of the story and create a map of where the rabbit traveled throughout the story. They participate in group...
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Musicians and Vampires
Students practice techniques and strategies for understanding the parts of a story to help them remember what they've read. They review and analyze the elements of a story and how to find them first in a paragraph and then in a book.
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And Tomorrow's Forecast Is...
Students create original short stories that feature distinctive weather phenomena, such as rainbows, snowstorms, tornadoes, thunder and/or lightning. They use a story map, imbedded in this plane, to help them organize their story.
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Nature’s Fury—Myths and Drama
Fifth graders explore the elements of theatre. In this dramatic performances lesson, 5th graders discuss the structural elements of theatre and dramatize "The Origins of the Season," an explanation myth.
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Community Map of The Giver
Middle schoolers read "The Giver" after finishing the unit on inventions and inventors. Using the information in the novel, they develop a geographic map illustrating the community in the story. They identify human and physical features...
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Rebus Writing
Fifth graders write rebus stories using technology. They share the rebus stories with younger students
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Using Inspiration Software to Explore Characters In Stories
Students identify characters, their qualities, and examples of their qualities and use Inspiration to organize them in a clear and understandable format. After a lecture/demo, students use the program on the next story by themselves.
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Problem & Solution Diagram
In this graphic organizer worksheet, students identify the key elements in a piece of literature. Students fill out the chart with the story's problem, character's goal, key events and the resolution.
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Finding Your Way Around A Map
Students use the Internet to learn and/or review map and globe skills and will recognize the difference in perspectives as shown on maps.
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Mapas Bailados: Creating Visual Representations of Dances Using Maps
Third graders listen to "Frank the Monster..." and discuss the dance map on the inside cover of the book. They create their own dance map using sentence strips to record the types of movement.
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Inferring Themes
Fifth graders practice making inferences on various types of reading material. As a class, they develop a definition of the word "theme" and discuss themes for some of their favorite stories. They use the context of the reading...
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In the Shadow of the Mountain by Helen Naylor
In this comprehension check worksheet, pupils respond to 44 matching, true/false, fill in the blank, and short answer questions before reading, while reading, and after reading In the Shadow of the Mountain by Helen Naylor in order to...
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Literature: Mapping the Mockingbird
Students read Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, focusing on setting. They list items that create mental images of the novel's setting along with location references to characters and events. Using posterboard, they construct physical...
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Literature Circle Role Descriptions
In this literature circle role descriptions worksheet, students identify the role they play in the literature circle. The different roles include: summarizer, vocabulary finder, questions writer, story mapper. Each role has three to...
ReadWriteThink
A High-Interest Novel Helps Struggling Readers Confront Bullying in Schools
Paul Langan's novel The Bully is the core text in a six-session unit plan that engages high schoolers in an in-depth examination of bullying and its effects on bullies, victims, and bystanders. The richly textured and carefully...
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Esperanza Rising - Anticipation Guide
Learn about Mexican culture while simultaneously strengthening reading, writing and computer skills. In order to get the most out of Esperanza Rising, pupils should have prior knowledge of Mexican culture. Therefore, there are links to a...
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Narrative Structure: Les Miserables
What is the initiating event? What is the protagonist's goal? What attempts are made to achieve this goal? What is the outcome? Model for your class how to map out the structure of any narrative. Readers then search for answers as the...
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Idioms Lesson Plan
Sixth graders discover idioms. In this idioms lesson, 6th graders evaluate idioms and discover their meaning. Students read Runny Babbit by Shel Silverstein and create unique idioms. Assessment rubric is provided.
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Aztec Myths 1
Students write a diary entry or a letter from the viewpoint of a character in a myth. In this Aztec myths lesson, students define myths and read "The Heart of Copil" and "The Eagle of Tenochtitlan" and find the land of the Aztecs on a...
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Ingredients of a Mystery
Students explore the concept of mysteries. For this mystery genre lesson, students identify the common characteristics of mystery books and use a story map to identify these characteristics in a given book. Students also discover the...
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Readers Who Struggle Can Learn From Wonderful Teacher/Student Created On-Level Reading Projects
Learners create their own books. In this book making lesson, students pick a subject and take photographs of it. They use these photographs to write their own story using their sight words.
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Beatrix Potter's Naughty Animal Tales
Students gain insight into the unusual, solitary world of Beatrix Potter's Victorian childhood and can compare/contrast it with their own world to explain why Potter wrote such simple stories and why she wrote about animals rather than...
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Charlotte's Web Trading Card
Students read Charlotte's Web, view variety of trading cards, discuss what they know about trading cards and their purpose, choose character from story, complete bubble map about character, and create character trading card using...
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A Year (a Day or a Week) In My Life as a Shorebird
Learners describe the basic life history of one shorebird common to their area. They use the writing process which includes brainstorming, rough draft writing, peer editing, and re-writing to create a factually and grammatically...