PBS
Pbs Learning Media: Out of Proportion
Students are asked to explain how natural disasters affect environmental health.
Online Writing Lab at Purdue University
Purdue University Owl: Fiction Writing Basics
This resource discusses some terms and techniques that are useful to the beginning and intermediate fiction writer, and to instructors who are teaching fiction at these levels. W.11-12.3a Narratives
Writing Fix
Writing Fix: The Sum of Its Parts
Inspired by Julianna's understanding (from the novel Flipped by Wendelin Van Draanen) that "A painting is more than the sum of its parts," learners will describe a memorable place that evokes a certain feeling or emotion. Students will...
Writing Fix
Writing Fix: Your Own Faraway Place
For this lesson, students will build background by hearing an excerpt from The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster, an excerpt where the main character, Milo, travels to a distant land that has a distinctive mood: melancholy. Next,...
Writing Fix
Writing Fix: Puns and Punctuation
A Writer's Workshop idea in which learners learn to use and punctuate adverbs and specific dialogue to create puns called Tom Swifties. Teacher instructions, student instructions, and student writing samples are provided, as well as an...
Writing Fix
Writing Fix: A Picture Book Writing Lesson: Start With What Isn't There
In this lesson plan, learners will describe a setting, attempting to set a mood for their readers in two paragraphs. Borrowing a technique from Stephen Kramer's two-page introduction to Caves, they will begin with a paragraph that...
Writing Fix
Writing Fix: Creating a Second Person Choice Story
This lesson plan is designed to help students understand plot dimensions and literary devices while writing a multi-faceted short story that has many possible outcomes. For inspiration, students will analyze songs that tell stories for...
Writing Fix
Writing Fix: Put 'Em on a Talk Show
In this lesson plan, students will write a script for a talk show, based on character traits from fairy tale stories. Scripts will be rehearsed, costumed, and performed in front of the class.
Writing Fix
Writing Fix: A Chapter Book Writing Lesson: Creating a Parallel World
Inspired by the opening events in The Subtle Knife by Philip Pullman, students are asked to create an original parallel world that is similar to ours but different in certain ways. They will focus on the similarities and differences...
Writing Fix
Writing Fix: A Small Moment With an Important Person
A writer's workshop idea where students brainstorm a list of people who are important to them as well as one or two times they remember being with each person. Students then use these ideas to write about a small moment with someone who...
Other
Indiana Univerisity of Pennsylvania: Writing Center: Descriptive Writing
This website from the Writing Center at Indiana Univerisity of Pennsylvania focuses on descriptive writing. It includes discussion and examples of the following: Creating a dominant impression or mood, using sensory details, using vivid...
Polk Brothers Foundation Center for Urban Education at DePaul University
De Paul University: Center for Urban Education: I Can Analyze a Story or History [Pdf]
This graphic organizer can be used to help students analyze a story or a historical event. Students will look closely at the story's characters or people involved in the historical event. Then they will summarize the story or event, and...
Other
San State Francisco University: Newsworx (1001 Words)
View the media-rich work of teams of student journalists assigned to produce high-interest feature stories using pictures, audio, and words. Learn how to tell a story well by thinking critically about the different choices made by each...
University of Victoria (Canada)
The U Vic Writer's Guide: Literary Term: Point of View
From the University of Victoria's writing tutorial site, this section provides a multiple-paragraph discussion of point of view.
Other
News Lab: Elements of Great Storytelling
This is a great site for broadcast journalists; it focuses on the elements that make a story great. You can find tips on writing from some of the top people in the industry.
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Holt, Rinehart and Winston: Elements of Literature: Narrator Chart [Pdf]
Provides an overview of the importance of a narrator in a text and some brief exercises for analysis. Helps students learn more about the role of the narrator in literature, his/her voice, and influence on other characters and events.
Writing Fix
Writing Fix: Counting Up or Down Stories
The writer will brainstorm situations where individuals or people in a group count up or count down out loud together. Using the ending of chapter 5 of Wringer by Jerry Spinelli as a model, the writer will plan a story where someone (or...
ReadWriteThink
Read Write Think: Exploring Perspective in Narrative
Interactive instructional activity which allows learners to determine the perspective or point of view of a story character by imagining actually spending a day in their "shoes." Based on Atticus's statement in "To Kill a Mockingbird."...
Tom Richey
Slide Share: Nonfiction
This downloadable slideshow focuses on nonfiction including definitions, types of nonfiction, perspective and bias, and objective vs. subjective.
Biz Move
Biz Move: Overcoming Communication Barriers How to Overcome Noise in Communication
Discusses communication barriers, particularly in the work environment, and examines how to overcome them. Barriers discussed include noise, faulty feedback, poor media selection, mental barriers, poor word selection, time and space...
Caro Clarke
Caro Clarke: What Is Conflict?
This is the sixth in a series of articles designed to help the new writer with their novel. This article focuses on conflict and how it effects the characters and the plot of the story. W.11-12.3a Narratives
Sophia Learning
Sophia: Determining Your Audience
On this website you will find information, two presentations, and a practice worksheet explaining how to decide the audience of a written piece and how to appeal to an intended or general audience in an original text....
Annenberg Foundation
Annenberg Learner: Literature: Exploring Point of View
Use these brief explanations to help you determine the narrator and point of view in any piece of literature. W.11-12.3a Narratives
ReadWriteThink
Read Write Think: Conflict Map
This graphic organizer focuses on conflict: identifying the conflict, listing possible resolutions, and determining the cause of the conflict. It can be used as a reading tool, a writing organizer, or solving a real-life conflict.