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Unit Plan
CommonLit

Common Lit: Where Did I Come From

For Students 5th - 6th Standards
CommonLit.org is a wonderful resource to use in a Language Arts classroom. Each story or article is accompanied by guided reading questions, assessment questions, and discussion questions. In addition, students can click on words to see...
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Unit Plan
CommonLit

Common Lit: Women in Ancient Rome

For Students 5th - 7th Standards
CommonLit.org is a wonderful resource to use in a Language Arts classroom. Each story or article is accompanied by guided reading questions, assessment questions, and discussion questions. In addition, students can click on words to see...
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Unit Plan
CommonLit

Common Lit: Duck & Cover: School Drills During the Cold War

For Students 5th - 6th Standards
CommonLit.org is a wonderful resource to use in a Language Arts classroom. Each story or article is accompanied by guided reading questions, assessment questions, and discussion questions. In addition, students can click on words to see...
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Article
Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD)

Ascd: Building Literacy in Social Studies: Ch 1: Reading Social Studies Texts

For Students 6th - 8th Standards
Article provides excellent tips and strategies for building comprehension and critical thinking skills in Social Studies. It describes some of the challenges students have with reading and understanding their textbooks.
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Website
Other

Reading Quest: Making Sense of Social Studies

For Teachers 9th - 10th Standards
Teaching students to read well in areas other than language arts requires teaching and reinforcing the kinds of reading strategies taught here. There are 27 strategies, ranging from brainstorming to word mapping. The site includes PDF...
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Lesson Plan
Better Lesson

Better Lesson: Analyzing Text Complexity of Non Fiction Sources

For Teachers 6th - 8th Standards
This lesson plan will help middle schoolers read and comprehend nonfiction, specifically biographies, through determining criteria for text complexity. Included is a PDF and Smart Notebook titled Determining Text Complexity, and an...
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Lesson Plan
Louisiana Department of Education

Louisiana Doe: Louisiana Believes: English Language Arts: Grade 6: If Stones Could Speak

For Teachers 6th Standards
Sixth graders will explore history and will learn that archaeologists, like detectives, work to piece together the past through investigation. Archaeological research provides us with stories of human history that help us understand the...
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Unknown Type
ProProfs

Pro profs.com: 8th Grade Main Idea Quiz

For Students 6th - 8th Standards
An interactive quiz with four short passages and thirteen multiple choice and extended response questions focusing on main ideas and supporting details. Students can access all passages and questions without an account, but a free...
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Website
E Reading Worksheets

E Reading Worksheets: Summarizing Worksheets and Activities

For Teachers 6th - 8th Standards
In this instructional resource, students will learn more about summarizing texts. Worksheets and PowerPoint lessons are provided to reinforce understanding about ways to summarize nonfiction texts and to identify main ideas. This module...
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Professional Doc
Wisconsin Response to Intervention Center

Wisconsin Rt I Center: Text Dependent Questions [Pdf]

For Teachers 9th - 10th Standards
Describes a reading strategy where students must respond to text by supporting their ideas with text-based evidence. Lists different categories of questions the teacher can prepare based on the text chosen, with examples for each.
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Handout
Curated OER

Mc Graw Hill: Use Details and Examples

For Students 6th - 8th Standards
Review how to use text evidence, details, examples, and personal experiences to make inferences then read a passage to practice on your own.
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Handout
Curated OER

Mc Graw Hill: Part 2 Reading: Determine Main Ideas and Supporting Details

For Students 3rd - 8th Standards
See how to pick out the main ideas and supporting details on this site. Click on Model at the bottom right.
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Handout
Curated OER

Mc Graw Hill: Part 2 Reading: Determine Main Ideas and Supporting Details

For Students 3rd - 8th Standards
See an example of how to determine the main ideas and supporting details of a story.
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Unit Plan
Curated OER

Mc Graw Hill: Part 2 Reading: Informational Text: Summarize

For Students 3rd - 6th Standards
Learn how to summarize a section of a text with this site.
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Graphic
Polk Brothers Foundation Center for Urban Education at DePaul University

De Paul University: Center for Urban Education: Read to Learn, Share What You Learn [Pdf]

For Students 3rd - 8th Standards
Several tips for reading to learn are provided on this page. Students will explore the BIG idea presented in a nonfiction piece.
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Unit Plan
Polk Brothers Foundation Center for Urban Education at DePaul University

De Paul University: Center for Urban Education: Classify and Summarize Information [Pdf]

For Students 2nd - 8th Standards
This learning module contains a link to graphic organizers that will help students categorize content and comprehend short and extended texts. The graphic organizers are designed to be applied to reading nonfiction passages in science...
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Activity
InterLink Language Centers

Interlink Language Centers: Reading Exercises Science

For Students 6th - 8th Standards
An interactive exercise for students to use while developing an understanding of how to read scientific informational texts. The text is presented one paragraph at a time and difficult vocabulary words are defined as footnotes. Then...
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Unit Plan
McGraw Hill

Mc Graw Hill:informational Text: Analyze Development of Text Elements:individuals

For Students 5th - 7th Standards
Read an informational piece, and learn how to analyze the development of individuals in the text. Includes practice exercises.
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Unit Plan
McGraw Hill

Mc Graw Hill: Informational Text: Analyze Development of Text Elements: Events

For Students 5th - 7th Standards
Read an informational piece, and learn how to analyze the development of an event in the text.
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Unit Plan
McGraw Hill

Mc Graw Hill: Informational Text: Determine Central Idea and Supporting Details

For Students 5th - 8th Standards
To understand a text, you must understand the central idea of the story. Learn how to recognize the central idea and supporting details with this article. Click the links at bottom right.
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Lesson Plan
ReadWriteThink

Read Write Think: Get the Gist: A Summarizing Strategy for Any Content Area

For Teachers 6th - 8th Standards
A five-part standards-based lesson plan in which students learn to write a 20 word summary of an informational text by focusing on answering the questions who, what, when, where, why, and how. This strategy can be applied to any content...
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Article
Other

Writing & Reading Success Center: Summarizing Paragraphs [Pdf]

For Students 6th - 8th Standards
An explanation and example of summarizing a paragraph, especially helpful for taking notes on texts.
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Website
Other

English Companion: Reading Expository Text

For Students 9th - 10th Standards
Taken from "Reading Reminders: Tools, Tips, and Techmiques," the information on this website provides advice on how to read, understand, analyze, and write expository texts.
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Website
Other

Reading Quest: Strategies for Reading Comprehension: Power Thinking

For Students 9th - 10th Standards
Looking for an alternative to formal outline instruction? Power Thinking teaches the concept of outlining but on a somewhat simplified level. The site is good for basic note-taking from a text.