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Understanding Protagonists and Antagonists
How can you tell if a character is a villain? What about a hero? Work on literary analysis with an engaging language arts worksheet. After completing an activity about the four types of conflict, learners fill out a character map about a...
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Children's Book Creations
Students create a children's book version of the Japanese folk story "Momotaro Boy of the Peach" and present the story to elementary students. In this children's book lesson, students design their book to explain Japanese culture to...
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Night on Bald Mountain
Learners use appropriate terms to reflect a working knowledge of the musical elements. Then they use terminology from music and other arts to analyze and compare the structures of musical and other artistic and literary works. Students...
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The Art of Imitation: Writing an Aristotelian Tragedy
Young scholars, after exploring the history of tragedies and analyzing Aristotelian elements in Greek/Roman tragedies, create their own tragedy set in modern context. They formulate their creations from an Aristotle platform. In...
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Analyzing Literature via Literature Circles
Introduce literature circles with Roland Smith's novels. Your seventh graders will see the activity modeled as you read The Three Little Pigs together and apply the format to a Roland Smith novel of their choice. The lesson includes...
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A Togolese Tale: The Big Fire
Students identify common elements found in folk tales and read a Togolese folk tale told by Fred Koehler. They analyze the folk tale for its elements and compare and contrast it with well-known Western folk tales.
National Endowment for the Humanities
A “New English” in Chinua Achebe’s “Things Fall Apart”: A Common Core Exemplar
To examine the “New English” Chinua Achebe uses in Things Fall Apart, readers complete a series of worksheets that ask them to examine similes, proverbs, and African folktales contained in the novel. Individuals explain the meaning...
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The Meaning of Christmas Told through a Mexican Folktale
Using a Tomie dePaola story, The Legend of the Poinsettia, your class can explore the meaning of Christmas.
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Surviving AIDS
Enhance your middle and high schoolers' research skills with this instructional activity. After viewing a video clip about HIV and AIDS, high schoolers identify the facts and issues surrounding the disease. They work together to create a...
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How Does Power Affect Conflict?
Students use several short stories to analyze different types of power. While discussing the role of power in these short stories, students will practice communication skills essential to conflict transformation, specifically attentive...
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The Rest Cure: Gender in Medicine and Literature
Read and discuss "The Yellow Wall-Paper" and the gender issues that the story brings up. Use articles from the time period to analyze, complete with specific discussion questions. After two days, scholars write an essay based on topics...
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Map of Ship Trap Island
Students read the short story "The Most Dangerous Game," and create maps of Ship Trap Island and justify why items are placed on their map in certain locations.
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What a Character!
Students look at the role of characters in a story. For this character lesson, students discuss how different types of characters change the plot of the story. They see how storytellers use their body, face, and voice to tell stories.
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The Cask of Amontillado
Students examine the Edgar Allan Poe story "The Cask of Amontillado." For this character lesson, students discuss and analyze the characters in the story. Students make personal connections to the characters and create a brochure...
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Lesson: Nikhil Chopra: Performing Memory
Film imitates life; that's what they say. Using performance theory to tie the lesson together, learners attempt to understand memory and daily rituals as seen in art, film, and life. They read two chapters from the book, watch the...
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Plot/Story Problem/Resolution
Students analyze the plot, problem, and resolution of a story. For this story analysis lesson, students read stories and fill out graphic organizers about the plot, story problems, and resolution.
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Diary of Anne Frank: Act 1 Scene 1 & 2
Eighth graders read act 1 scenes 1 & 2 of the play Diary of Anne Frank. In this Diary of Anne Frank lesson plan, 8th graders discuss how the setting of the play affects the mood of the story and answer short answer questions.
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Laurence Yep's, Dragonwings
Students discuss vocabulary words and compare definitions. They read chapters 6-9 of the novel, Dragonwings, and discuss point of view, and complete a plot diagram. Then they review the four types of conflict and identify the conflicts...
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Revealing Untold Stories
Students explore how and why various historical resources present information about slavery differently. They work in pairs to examine written texts to interpret the objectives, points of view, and depictions of slavery in these resources.
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Lively Read of the Tale of Despereaux
Students create a character map of the main characters in The Tale of Despereaux. After reading the text, students create a character chart based on information they gleaned from the story. They use this information to write a letter...
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Oliver Twist Goes to Hollywood
How does Oliver Twist, the novel written by Charles Dickens, compare with its screenplay adaptation? Although the activity doesn't require learners to have read the novel, the similarities and differences of the highlighted passages...
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Bunnicula
Learners create a dictionary of vocabulary after reading a story. Individually, they create a story web making sure to include all of the basic story elements. They also create a timeline and write a book report of all important events.
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Identifying Themes in Children's Literature
Identifying themes in literature is the focus of the language arts lesson plan presented here. Learners read short pieces of fiction and practice the skill of identifying the themes present in each one. The bulk of the lesson consists of...
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Investigating Fables
Time for a story! Learners of all ages enjoy listening to stories, so read them some common fables and have them work cooperatively to create a fable. Differentiate for varying ability levels by providing sentence frames, graphic...