College Board
Evaluating Sources: How Credible Are They?
How can learners evaluate research sources for authority, accuracy, and credibility? By completing readings, discussions, and graphic organizers, scholars learn how to properly evaluate sources to find credible information. Additionally,...
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: Audience, Tone, and Style in Informative Text
Students will read samples of informative writing and highlight examples of how tone and style are used by the authors. Students will then apply this knowledge by writing their own informative text. Multiple examples of student work and...
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: A Storm of Ideas
The first step in writing an informational text on the topic of learners' choice is helping the student choose a topic of interest. Students will brainstorm ideas that will be possible final topics.
US Department of Education
U.s. Dept. Of Education: Teaching Approaches: Text Comprehension Instruction
What is text comprehension? How does comprehension improve our reading ability? Check out this site to learn more about reading comprehension instruction. There are some wonderful suggestions for teachers to implement in their classrooms.
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: Writing an Opinion Based on Facts From a Text
Students will plan a paragraph that states their opinion and cites evidence to justify their opinion about an informational text. This lesson uses biographies since students can easily be able to write down factual information from the...
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: Cities in Mesopotamia: Understanding a Complex Text
In this instructional activity, 6th graders use details from a nonfiction article to create a visual representation and then, from that visual, provide evidence that demonstrates their understanding of the text. Includes samples of...
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: Similarities and Differences Between Two Text
For this lesson, through guided practice, the students use two texts about Martin Luther King to compare the similarities and differences between those texts. Includes videos of the lesson in action, printable charts, and a graphic...
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: Comparing and Contrasting With "Then and Now"
This lesson is a great small group reading lesson that has a social studies connection. In this lesson, learners will be comparing and contrasting schools from long ago and schools of today using informational texts. Included are...
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: A Day to Celebrate Our Planet Earth
Students will compare an informational text versus a narrative text about Earth Day. Included in this lesson are videos and pictures of the lesson in action, a printable Earth Day Venn Diagram, and a recycling activity.
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: Bat Versus Bird
Students compare and contrast two animals to recall learned information so they can share two facts using the informational text "The Best Nest". Included is a video explanation, a printable graphic organizer, samples of student work,...
CommonLit
Common Lit: Teaching Kids in Vietnam to Avoid a Deadly, Everyday Legacy of War
A learning module that begins with "Teaching Kids in Vietnam to Avoid a Deadly, Everyday Legacy of War" by Michael Sullivan, accompanied by guided reading questions, assessment questions, and discussion questions. The text can be printed...
Texas Education Agency
Texas Gateway: Teaching Expository & Persuasive Texts: Writing Expository Essays
In an expository essay, a type of informational text, the writer clarifies or explains something by using facts, details, and examples in a clear and concise way. To write an effective expository essay, students need a basic...
Other
Paired Passages: Working With Paired Passages Leaning in to Get the Learning Out
This slideshow explains how to teach students to compare and contrasts informational texts that have related topics. Henry County Schools in Georgia compiled this resource.
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: Learning About Subheadings and Bold Words
In this lesson plan, students will use several strategies to learn the meaning of new words they encounter in text. The students will learn specific strategies so when they encounter new words, they can figure out the meaning of those...
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: From Seed to Plant
Students will use the illustrations and details in the text to describe how plants grow. This lesson uses a complex text to allow students to analyze the pictures in From Seed to Plant and From Seed to Pumpkin. Included are videos and...
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: Comparing & Contrasting Inventors
What do inventors have that are alike? How are they different? Why do they invent? Learning about them may inspire you to invent new technology! In this instructional activity, students will compare and contrast key details in two texts...
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: Ew, Gross!
In this lesson, young scholars will be able to gather information from provided resources to answer a question. Using the book "Owls", the teacher will read the book while asking guiding questions. After the book, the students will have...
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: Sl.3.2: Determine the Main Ideas and Supporting Details of a Text
Links to 44 lessons and activities that build student skills in standard SL.3.2: Determine the main ideas and supporting details of a text read aloud or information presented in diverse media and formats, including visually,...
AdLit
Ad lit.org: Multiple Texts: Multiple Opportunities for Teaching and Learning
Engaging all students in a themed study or unit is a challenge that teachers can resolve by using materials that match students' independent or instructional reading levels (Robb 1994, 2000). When students face textbooks that are above...
Read Works
Read Works: 1st Grade Lesson: Classifying Texts
[Free Registration/Login Required] A lesson plan in which students use the books Froggy Goes to School by Jonathan London and Life Cycle of a Frog by Angela Royston to learn to classify texts as fiction or nonfiction. Lesson includes...
ReadWriteThink
Read Write Think: Draw a Story: Stepping From Pictures to Writing
Help young students move from drawing pictures into writing simple stories. Good plan for having students put pictures in sequential order and teaching them about sequential order.
National Endowment for the Humanities
Neh: Edsit Ement:portrait of a Hero
Discussing real life heroes and heroines and viewing their pictures will help learners learn about reading and writing biographies. A writing rubric assessment is included in this series of activities designed to teach about heroes and...
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: The Leprechaun Companion
In this lesson, 5th graders will explain the meaning of a text and its genre, summarize it, and draw conclusions. They work with a book called The Leprechaun Companion which is a cross between informational and literary text.
Better Lesson
Better Lesson: Using the Five Finger Rule
Students identify text features in nonfiction, as they continue to study cells' function as building blocks of organisms, and summarize the requirements for cells to live.