Explore the discrepancies in Florida's vote counting process in 2000 and 2002 with this New York Times reading lesson. Middle schoolers study the viewpoints presented in informational text, paying attention to how word choice can...

Students practice their reading, writing, and listening skills by completing the sentence writing journal activity. In this reading and writing sentences lesson, students read sentences from the board, identify vocabulary within the...

An authentic and engaging way to practice literacy skills, this activity calls for young language arts pupils to conduct interviews with classmates and family members. First, pupils watch as the teacher models the interview process with...

Third graders create reports in the fashion of small books. They write brief descriptions for a variety of topics and answering a variety of questions. They create a picture book for their individual animals. They utilize basic computer...

Here's a fresh take on the student writing portfolio. Consider having learners create an electronic portfolio. After examining sample e-portfolios, class members explore various software programs they will use throughout the course and...

Students explore animal habitats.  In this cross curriculum animal survival and writing lesson plan, students view a website about wild horses on Shackelford Island and discuss ways in which the horses have changed to this...

Add a strong poetry lesson to your literature unit. Middle and high schoolers investigate their writing voices with journaling and group discussion, then choose a famous poet to study. They write letters to their chosen poets, explaining...

Planning is the key to success. Scholars continue planning their essays by adding reasons to their Planning My Argument graphic organizers. Additionally, pupils analyze a body paragraph from a model position paper, identifying the...

Use the Internet, write an expository text, and have young scholars share their knowledge of the planets in our solar system. They compose an expository writing piece and publish it to a web page.

Upper graders investigate how the Seventh Day Adventists are objectors to the practice of war. The lesson plan covers the Civil War and examines the church's position about the practice of war. The research extends to modern wars and...

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...

Pupils complete various activities to investigate growing apples. They examine words related to apple growth and write the words on apple shapes. They also take a vocabulary quiz and complete an apple concentration game. Next, they watch...

Middle or high school volcanologists watch the 1997 film, Dante's Peak. They make observations as they watch and then write a movie review, focusing on what was accurately represented. They also point out what facts were stretched by...

Introduce young writers to the process of writing a book. Start by reading a book of your choice and discussing the essential elements of any book such as the cover, story, and illustrations as well as who is responsible for each...

Improve your young poets' descriptive writing with this lesson on personification. A SMART board and PowerPoint presentation guide your class through the process of identifying human qualities attributed to various non-human objects. A...

Examine stories with a moral in a character development instructional activity. The class reads a short story written by Benjamin Franklin in which he pays too much for a toy whistle. Individuals then make text-to-self connections and...

If you are teaching Aeschylus' Prometheus Bound, you can't afford to miss this source. An extensive list of ideas outlines numerous discussion topics, writing prompts, comprehension questions, oral presentations, and projects. Have class...

What are the effects of competition in an academic environment? The competition between the main characters in A Separate Peace motivates a series of activities that asks readers to take a stance on competition, and then to develop a...

What does commentary have to do with narrative? Before scholars explain the narrative choices in their Character Confessionals, they review provided commentary to explain the score they received on previous assessments. They review...

How authors address issues of their societies is addressed in this very detailed lesson. After researching Toni Morrison and her work, groups create a dramatization based on a scene from one of Morrison’s novels and act it out. Class...

After reading Sandra Cisneros’ novel The House on Mango Street, class members design a canned food drive, create advertisements for the drive, and use digital cameras to document the entire process. In addition, pupils journal their...

"Warning: Conducting this lesson may be harmful." Such statements, called "Trigger Warnings," are the focus of a two-part lesson that looks at censorship, especially the pros and cons of trigger warnings. Class members read two articles,...

The 11th resource in a 12-part poetry unit is a bonus lesson comprised of poems, activities, and resources that review the essential concepts of the unit.

Scholars read three texts and analyze the dialogue of the characters to find examples of humor and irony that contribute to their characterization. They then walk through the writing process to create a final essay.