Curated OER
Vocabulary: Multiple Meaning Words in Context
Learners use context clues to define words with multiple meanings. After extensive practice with their teacher, learners read through six sentences, they then identify a word with a multiple meaning, and determine its meaning based on...
Curated OER
Word Origins
Have you ever studied historical words and found that they were deeply rooted in racism or prejudice? Select a long list of these words to have your class examine. What familiar roots do they have? Do they know when this word originally...
Curated OER
Lyddie: An Instructional Unit Resource Guide
Katherine Paterson’s young adult novel Lyddie is the foundation of a differentiated instruction unit that not only explores the rise of industrialization and labor but women’s rights issues as well. After learners read the novel, they...
Curated OER
What's in a Word?
Students complete a unit on words, their origins, and their usage. They explore various websites, create a word ladder online, develop a list of anagrams, write a story using homonyms, and create a list of vocabulary words.
Boys Town
Teaching Social Skills, Creating Successful Students “Following Instructions” and “Listening”
With the help from learning games and holiday-themed coloring pages, scholars learn the importance of listening carefully and following directions. Coloring pages celebrate Halloween and Thanksgiving. Learning games include...
Curated OER
Reading
Primary readers read books in order to practice word recognition, rhyming, and play reading games. They will "read" simple books to reinforce basic reading skills in order to create a foundation. Readers are available to print out along...
Curated OER
Vocabulary through Text
Explore word meanings. Sixth graders identify examples of words with affixes while listening to the story Paul Bunyan by Steven Kellogg. They participate in the game "Pass the Parts" and practice separating given words into their root...
Curated OER
Introducing Synonyms to Early Writers
Upper elementary schoolers examine the concept of synonyms and how using a variety of vocabulary through synonyms can expand their writing skills. They revise a paragraph using synonyms located on the Visual Thesaurus and participate in...
Curated OER
Playing Vocabulary Basketball
Learners view a slide show featuring famous athletes and educational institutions that have played a part in the history of basketball. They participate in a game in which a basketball is tossed from person to person as facts and...
Curated OER
Introduce Vocabulary: Blueberries for Sal (McCloskey)
Take your budding readers on a literary trip to pick blueberries as they learn vocabulary from Robert McClosky's book, Blueberries for Sal. By pre-teaching the words pupils are prepared to raise their hands when they hear...
Curated OER
Student Dictionary
Third graders practice dictionary skills. They use a digital camera and insert pictures from a floppy disk into a document. They play a game in which they are handed an anonymous definition of each other and must find each other in class.
Curated OER
The Outsiders
Tenth graders complete a variety of activities related to the first two chapters of the book The Outsiders. They define metaphor, simile, idiom, and hyperbole, and take a vocabulary pre-quiz. In small groups, they write a character...
Curated OER
Introduce Vocabulary: Franklin's New Friend (Bourgeois)
Franklin the turtle makes a new friend as youngsters learn vocabulary in context using Paulette Bourgeois' story (tip: this strategy can be applied to any book). Brief kids on the new words so they can raise their hands when they...
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Three Skeleton Key
Encourage your students to interact with the text as they read. While reading "Three Skeleton Key," class members note predictions, define words and study their meanings, take notes on how the suspense builds, and jot down ideas...
EngageNY
Synthesizing Chávez’s Central Claim
Class members play an interactive game, matching strips of paper containing rhetorical devices with examples from César Chávez use rhetoric in his 1984 speech, "Address to the Commonwealth Club of California." Next, partners discuss...
EngageNY
Close Reading: Excerpt 3 of “The Digital Revolution and the Adolescent Brain Evolution”
It's time to level up and discover how video games affect the brain. Pupils explore the topic as they continue reading excerpts from an article about adolescent brain development and the digital revolution. Scholars also participate in a...
Curated OER
How to Teach Dolch Words with Kid Pix
Students use KidPix computer program to learn Dolch sight words. In this technology and language lesson, students type their Dolch sight words into KidPix to create a quasi-sentence.
Curated OER
Excel, Word, and Basketball
Wow, this instructional activity packs a punch. Pupils interview basketball players, write about a game, and use Excel to organize statistics related to the players and the points scored. Afterward, they create posters, presentations,...
Curated OER
ABC, Easy as 123
Kindergartners practice identifying the sight and sounds of vowels and consonants. They identify beginning consonants in single-syllable words and print the letters of the alphabet. This outstanding resource has many excellent...
The Kennedy Center
Fairy Tale Variations
Here are two great lessons that work together and are inspired by the Stephen Sondheim musical Into the Woods. Young writers and actors will retell the story of "The Frog Prince" through games, improvisational script writing, and...
Curated OER
Sounding Out Accuracy: Word Swatter Game
Students explore word fluency by participating in a language arts game. In this vocabulary identification lesson, students collaborate in two small teams, each armed with a fly swatter, in order to swat vocabulary words spoken by their...
Curated OER
Snake and Sight Word Board Game
Students practice sight words. Game begins with the first student rolling a die and moving the number of spaces shown on the die. If they lands on a shaded square, he or she turns up a card and reads it aloud.
Alabama Learning Exchange
Compound Words
Learners identify compound words in the story, "Once There Was A Bull." They work with a partner to discuss what makes up a compound word and participate in a game that helps them to understand the concept better. As the assessment...
Pennsylvania Department of Education
Working with Words Teacher Directed Activity by Mark Cogan for Elem. Test Prep
Students build word families. In this interactive language arts activity, students visit a website where they play a game creating word families. Students may print out their work when finished.