Curated OER
Writing a Halloween Poem
A delightful lesson on poetry is here for you and your middle schoolers. Learners are instructed to write a Halloween poem. They get to choose the age range for the audience of the poem. So, it may be scary (for older kids), or humorous...
Scholastic
Writing Letters to the Chancellors of the Academy of American Poets
To celebrate National Poetry Month, young writers focus on the role letter writing has played in the development of poets. They begin by journaling three to five associations to a writing prompt that requires them to identify their...
Curated OER
How Do Adjectives Improve Writing?
Using adjectives to create vivid descriptions is the focus of exercises in this resource. A cloze reading activity asks class members to add missing adjectives to passages from Mark Teague's The Lost and Found. They then read...
Maine Content Literacy Project
Introduction to the Short Story
How should pupils read short stories? Set them up for this unit with an introductory lesson plan that goes over the main characteristics of a short story and starts learners off reading their first short story of the unit. In order to...
Novelinks
The House of the Scorpion: Request Strategy
Readers of The House of the Scorpion try to stump their teacher in a QAR questioning game. Pairs craft Right There, Think and Search, On Your Own, and the Author and You questions and the class members then take turns responding to...
Novelinks
The Devil’s Arithmetic: QAR Strategy
Asking questions about the text is an important way for kids to become critical readers. Use a QAR activity based on The Devil's Arithmetic to help learners decipher between questions that are right there, between the author and the...
Maryland Department of Education
The Concept of Diversity in World Literature Lesson 1: Unit Introduction
To launch a unit study of the concept of diversity in World Literature, class members compare Chinua Achebe's essay, "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness" and Richard Rodriguez's essay, "The Chinese in All of...
Turabian Teacher Collaborative
Parts of Argument II: Article Critique
Break down the parts of argumentative writing with a critical thinking activity. High schoolers read an article of your (or their choice), and use a graphic organizer to delineate the ways the author structures his or her arguments.
PBL Pathways
Medical Insurance 3
Create a technical report explaining the components of a medical plan through a function. The project-based learning activity gives a medical insurance scenario that young mathematicians model using piecewise functions. Their analyses...
California Education Partners
Eleven
It is difficult to articulate how growing up feels as accurately and beautifully as Sandra Cisneros does in her short story "Eleven." After seventh graders read the story and note the author's use of figurative language, they respond to...
California Education Partners
Tuck Everlasting
An assessment takes a close look at the story, Tuck Everlasting by Natalie Babbitt, and tests writing abilities. Over the course of two days, scholars read an excerpt, answer questions on a worksheet pertaining to the author's...
Curated OER
Scientific Detectives
Middle schoolers examine the legitimacy of advertisers' claims about products using science and critical thinking. They view and discuss ads, read a case study, and conduct an experiment to demonstrate whether a product lives up to its...
Curated OER
# 03 Laboratory Ventilation and Risk Assessment Exercise
Students are introduced to the analysis of health risks in the laboratory, particularly from vapors from organic solvents. They consider quantitative measure of risk such as threshold limit values (TLVs), the amount of the compound that...
Curated OER
Lesson Plan: A Guided Tour
Albert Bierstadt's painting Wind River Country shows viewers how a reader progresses through a story. Your class studies the light and dark areas, how the eye moves across the painting, and what attracts the audience to the work, and...
Curated OER
Writing Fables
Students write their own fables. In this writing fables lesson plan, students use handheld computers to write a fable. The class designs a spreadsheet to organize common elements of fables. Students also edit each others' work.
Curated OER
Gathering Statistics for Research
Students gather statistics to include in their research. In this statistics lesson plan, students investigate how to incorporate statistics into research and other readings besides math. They collect data based on other topics, analyze...
Curated OER
ICYouSee: A Lesson in Critical Thinking
Stress the importance of authenticating online resources and understanding the sources of websites' information with this activity. Using a Web-based activity, the lesson plan prompts young learners to think critically about determining...
Media Awareness Network
Images of Learning: Elementary
Tired of 20-somethings portraying high school middle schoolers? Tired of athletes and principals always being the villains? Class members examine the student and teacher stereotypes presented TV shows and films that are et in schools.
Curated OER
Marketing to Teens: Introduction
An introductory instructional activity shows learners how pervasive and influential advertising is in our culture; particularly, how teenagers are actively targeted by advertisers. As teenagers, your students already have all the...
Media Smarts
Teaching TV: Television Techniques
As part of a five-lesson unit on how television uses technology and film techniques to communicate meaning, elementary students create their own media productions that demonstrate their understanding of these concepts.
BW Walch
Unexpected Family History
The history of the northern states' involvement in the slave trade is not widely known. This resource uses the PBS documentary, Traces of the Trade, and the nonfiction book, Children of the New England Slave Trade, to examine this aspect...
PBS
Copyright and Fair Use
When is using someone else's copyrighted material appropriate? Learn about copyright and fair use with a instructional activity from PBS.org. Scholars read through a reference sheet about authors' rights and users' rights, and then...
Carson-Dellosa Publishing
Boho Birds Bulletin Board
Maybe you're studying the life cycle of a bird, or maybe you're doing an author study in language arts. Whatever the case may be, use a set of bulletin board ideas any time of the year. Tailor the provided ideas to make them your...
Northern Lights Special Education Cooperative
Lessons from The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens
As part of a study of Sean Covey, the author of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens learners write autobiographical e-mails, hold discussions, create a collage, and compose a personal mission statement. Pupils then have a...