K12 Reader
Using Prior Knowledge
Sometimes it's hard to relate to a new text. Teach kids to use their prior knowledge when reading something new with a comprehension exercise. A short passage tells them how to think of their brains like filing systems, and provides five...
Curated OER
Reading Comprehension Strategy: Using Background Knowledge
The value of this presentation is that it not only defines background knowledge but includes exercises that show readers how to activate and use what they already know about a topic to make text-to-self, text-to-text, and text-to-world...
West Contra Costa Unified School District
Using Derivatives to Graph Polynomials
You can learn to graph as well as a calculator using calculus. The lesson introduces using derivatives to find critical points needed to graph polynomials. Pupils learn to find local maximums and minimums and intervals of increase and...
Curated OER
Understanding a Story
Reading comprehension is the name of the game! After listening to the teacher model and share personal prior knowledge about small children and what they do with food, the class discusses how they too can use prior knowledge to...
Media Smarts
Facing TV Violence: Consequences and Media Violence
Make your class aware of the difference between media violence and real violence. Using prior knowledge, a video clip, and a worksheet, class members explore and discuss the unrealistic portrayal of violence in the media. Learners...
Curated OER
Using Prior Knowledge from Personal Experiences-Understanding Duke Ellington
Students research the life of Duke Ellington. In this music history lesson, students draw comparisons between the early life experiences of Duke Ellington and themselves. Students work in small groups to compare Ellington's resistance...
Curated OER
Prior Knowledge: What Do You Know About Dogs?
Students consciously activate prior knowledge in order to comprehend new information about a given subject. In this comprehension and prior knowledge activity, students use a graphic organizer to activate prior knowledge and use their...
Curated OER
The Three Little Pigs
Kindergarteners are presented with three types of materials: real straw, sticks, and a real brick and make prior knowledge connections as it relates to the story of The Three Little Pigs. They listen to the story and work together to...
Baylor College
Needs of Living Things: Pre-Assessment
Determine your class's prior knowledge about the necessities of life with this pre-assessment for a unit on living things. Learners draw pictures of themselves with all the things they need to live, grow, and survive. These drawings will...
EngageNY
Advanced Factoring Strategies for Quadratic Expressions (part 1)
Factoring doesn't have to be intimidating. Build on prior knowledge of multiplying binomials and factoring simple trinomials to teach advanced factoring of quadratic expressions with a lesson that uses various methods of exploring the...
E Reading Worksheets
Context Clues
Reinforce language and reading comprehension skills with a worksheet focused on context clues. Scholars carefully read twelve sentences, use prior knowledge and sentence clues to define an unknown word.
Street Law
The Challenge of Selecting an Ideal Supreme Court Nominee
Nearly every president has had the opportunity to name a nominee to the United States Supreme Court. But what makes someone an ideal candidate to become a Supreme Court justice? High schoolers test their prior knowledge about the Supreme...
K20 LEARN
Untwining And Intertwining: Chemical Reactions
What happened when the chemistry teacher told a bad joke? There was no reaction! A creative take on the traditional reaction types lesson invites learners to draw their own conclusions about how compounds and elements combine. Groups...
Bonneville
Probes of Prior Knowledge
A bright future learning about electricity awaits. Future scientists conduct two probes to investigate electrical energy. The first requires them to think about how electricity is made, while the second has them identify appliances that...
Curated OER
Indirectly Direct
Students use prior knowledge of angle and lines as they conduct an experiment with a rolling marble to determine the shape of a mystery object located under a metal pie tin.
EngageNY
Connecting Informational Text with Litearature: Building Background Knowledge About Mexican Immigration, California, and the Great Depression
Help your class transition as the setting in the novel Esperanza Rising, by Pam Muñoz Ryan, moves from Mexico to California. Beginning with prior knowledge, and moving into jigsaw research groups, class members add to and create posters...
University of Colorado
Using Spectral Data to Explore Saturn and Titan
Saturn's rings are made of dust, ice, and solid chunks of material. Individuals use spectrographs in this final installment of 22 lessons to determine the atmospheric elements. They analyze spectrums from Titan's atmosphere and Saturn's...
Learning A-Z
Tips for Teaching: Word Recognition
Learning to read can be exhilarating for some pupils, but for others, it's difficult to get past the frustration of not knowing how to read a particular word. A tutoring resource provides several ways to guide class members into...
Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Using Genetic Crosses to Analyze a Stickleback Trait
Two fish appear different, but how do scientists determine their genotypes? Scholars practice performing test crosses to determine the genotypes of fish given their phenotypes. They answer in-depth comprehension questions and complete...
Florida Center for Reading Research
Comprehension: Monitoring for Understanding, What Do You Know?
An activity promotes reading comprehension. Readers analyze a text of their choice while activating prior knowledge and asking and answering questions. Scholars enforce multiple strategies to improve comprehension.
Curated OER
What You See Is What You Read
Using the popular text Franklin Goes to the Hospital, youngsters make predictions by looking at the cover of the book. They draw their predictions, listen to the story, and compare their predictions to what actually happened in the story.
Curated OER
Introduce: The Suffix -ing
Second and third graders are introduced to the suffix ing and examine a list of words with the suffix. They examine the meaning of the target suffix as it relates to the present verb tense and connect suffix ing words with prior...
Curated OER
Build Mastery: Making Inferences
Do your youngsters realize that they are constantly making inferences? Expose this inner process by bringing out the book they will be reading. Ask scholars what they think the plan is, and explain that their answers are the product of...
Curated OER
General Knowledge 'A'
Get your learners' brains warmed up with this short quiz about high-level words that begin with the letter a. There are a total of 10 multiple-choice questions. This is a great worksheet to use prior to a language arts lesson! Note: You...