Students explore the significance of the Louisiana Purchase and the journey of Lewis and Clark's Corps of Discovery. They read to explain a new topic and write to inform readers of the historic events they explored.

Students create and write a "Choose Your Own Adventure" story as they investigate the Revolutionary War. They choose a historical figure who played a key role in the war who meets other influential figures and has the opportunity to...

Eighth graders select their own plot of land in the Backcountry to settle in the 1700s in SC.  Students first find a point for settlement and sketch out the best route from the Lowcountry to arrive at the point.  They...

Students uncover the roots of the Cold War. In this Cold War instructional activity, students research the political philosophies of the Soviet Union and the United States during the era as they define key vocabulary and discuss...

Twelfth graders discover how to debate important social issues in a civil manner. They explain the importance of knowledge in public discourse.

Use this lesson to focus on a compare and contrast writing structure in your middle school language arts class. Here, young writers compare and contrast two texts using graphic organizers. They use a double bubble format for their...

Examine the power of persuasion and have learners consider how it influences events in their own lives. After reading and analyzing informational texts to understand the author's purpose, class members take a written test and craft a...

Although this legislative process instructional activity is designed to accompany a specific text, it is valuable independently. Young learners participate in a picture walk (worksheet included) through My Senator and Me:...

Originally designed for a physical education classroom, this lesson plan asks learners to argue for their school to keep their PE class during budget cuts. Whether your school is facing this challenge or not, it does pose a great...

Introduce your class to fairy tales with this instructional activity. After reading the fractured fairy tale, "The Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig," third, fourth, and fifth graders write a personal narrative as a response to the...

Concepts are only valuable if they are applicable. An informative resource uses concepts developed in lessons 26 and 27 in a 36-part series. Scholars write equations and solve for missing side lengths for given right triangles....

Young mathematicians first graph a series of quadratic equations, and then investigate how various parts of the equation change the graph of the function in a predictable way.

Students compare the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of the Child to the Bill of Rights. In this social justice lesson, students read and analyze both documents. Students discuss how the documents compare and then write their...

Students write series of journal entries, from the perspective of an immigrant traveling to America via Ellis Island.

Fifth graders research, examine and study about the three branches of the government and the contents of the Constitution including both the Articles and the Amendments. They create their own classroom constitution at the end of the unit.

Fifth graders discover the Civil War as taught by their peers. In this Civil War activity, 5th graders create their own lesson plans to teach the class about the Civil War. The students are monitored by the teacher but are given lectures...

Eighth graders discover details about delegates to the American Constitutional Convention. In this U.S. Constitution lesson, 8th graders research information about 9 delegates to the convention and then write paragraphs about the most...

Students study immigration, Ellis Island, and tenement life from 1890 to 1924. Each student create an identity of an immigrant and write an essay in the first person. Essays describe what they found when they arrived in New York City.

Students explore different spellings of the same words within the English language, as well as different words for the same thing with the international pen pal classroom. They become familiar with units of measure and time. Students...

Eighth graders examine the role of Indiana soldiers in the Civil War. In this American Civil War lesson, 8th graders listen to a lecture about the involvement of Indiana soldiers in the war and then analyze letters written home by the...

Summary writing is tough for native English speakers, let alone English language learners! In this plan, high school English learners examine how to annotate online articles and write a one-page summary. They can post this summary on...

Determine the author's purpose in writing a memoir. Eighth graders work in groups  to elicit author's purpose in memoirs, taking care to note how subtle the message can be hidden throughout the work. This lesson is a good way to...

Organizing information gathered for a research topic can be a challenge. Read aloud notes you have collected on a topic and use suggestions offer by the class to categorize and sort this information. Partners then follow this pattern,...

Young historians interpret historical evidence presented in primary and secondary resources in this American Revolution lesson. They select topics from the time era that they are interested in researching. Additionally, they follow...