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Design a Book Cover
Learners use the programs Pics4Learning and ImageBlender 3 to apply their knowledge of characters, plot, setting, symbolism, and conflict to design and create a book cover. Designed as a culminating literature activity.
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Comparing Characters Across Two Short Stories
Ninth graders listen to a read aloud of two short stories focusing on literary devices. The write about the settings and realism of the stories, and decide each main character handles the conflict he faces with nature.
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The Bracelet: Five Senses
Students investigate the 5 senses by reading children's literature. In this descriptive writing activity, students read the story The Bracelet by Yoshiko Uchida, analyzing the story and characters as they go. Students identify the use of...
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Movie Analysis
Fourth graders discuss main concept, supporting details, plot, setting, major events, problems, conflicts, and resolution in two short stories. They apply these terms to a movie of their choice. They compare analysis of movies to...
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Chaucer's Wife of Bath
Students analyze Chaucer's portrayal of the Wife of Bath in The Canterbury Tales. Students prepare class reports on the institution of marriage and the place of women in the Medieval society.
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Pretest
Ninth graders take part in a lesson plan that is concerned with testing grammar knowledge for the basis of placement by level into a summer school program. They conduct a pre-test to get some preliminary data and analyze the information...
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Eudora Welty's "A Worn Path" in Graphical Representation
Learners analyze graphical forms of Eudora Welty and interpret the shorts stories in the representations. In this graphical representations lesson, students analyze the short story genre in comic strips. Learners then create their own...
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Beowulf Lesson Plan
Young scholars analyze the text of Beowulf. In this epic poetry lesson, students explore the themes and imagery in the text to evaluate their meaning. Young scholars analyze the Old English language and examine the cultural and...
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Cause and effect Relationship
Students examine folk’s tales for Cause and Effect. In this literature lesson plan, students read "The Origin of Fire" and "The Origin of Medicine” and look for cause and effect. They use a TI Navigator to write down their findings.
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Tolkien's Moral Universe
Young scholars analyze the landscape used in Tolkien's "Lord of the Rings". In groups, they discuss how Tolkien developed Elrond's promise and develop a case assuming Tolkien rejected "Manichaean dualism". They also compare and...
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Is there a map in that story?
Eighth graders examine different pieces of literature from specific isolated Pacific islands. In this Geography instructional activity, 8th graders read and interpret a written selection. Students construct a map of the stories setting.
MENSA Education & Research Foundation
Magical Musical Tour: Using Lyrics to Teach Literary Elements
Language arts learners don't need a lecture about poetry; they listen to poetry every day on the radio! Apply skills from literary analysis to famous songs and beautiful lyrics with a lesson about literary devices. As class...
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Beowulf: Songs of Ancient Heroes
Introduce your class to epic heroes with these activities for Beowulf. After watching a video clip, taking notes on heroes, and tracking characteristics of heroism throughout Beowulf, class members retell an episode of Beowulf using a...
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Breaking Free From Conformity
Learners reflect upon how Transcendentalism focuses on individualism. From their belief that God was within every person to their steadfast belief that every man should make decisions based on personal moral values, individualism was...
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Hermeneutics: Teaching Students Author's Purpose
Your developing literary critics discuss 'perspective' and discuss how the same occurence can be interpreted by two different people in two different ways. They read Ryszard Kapuscinski's untitled poem, infer meaning of the poem, and...
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Shakespeare 2000
Young thespians can try their hand at writing a script and acting out a scene, while gaining a deeper understanding of the universal topics presented in Shakespeare's wide array of plays. Begin the lesson by conducting a compare and...
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Goldilocks Revisited
Second graders investigate the story of "The Three Bears" while focusing on the character of Goldilocks. They answer key questions that are focused upon the development of positive feelings and reactions. Students discuss the possible...
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Modernism in Poetry, Painting, and Music
Are you teaching Modernism to your class? Connect different areas of artistic expression in the Modernist Era. Learners read T.S. Eliot, view art by Pablo Picasso, and listen to a Modernist musical composition. This final assignment is...
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"Knot" the Whole Truth: Writing a Modern-Day Story with a Tall Tale's Voice
Beyond Paul Bunyan and his blue ox, tall tales can be a great way to teach young writers about word choice and voice in their writing. Using Jerry Spinelli's Maniac Magee and the Six-Trait Writing process, they begin to write their own...
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A Creative Presentation
Bring writing to life with this lesson in which elementary and middle schoolers create a display of the imagery they identify in a series of Gary Paulsen books. They read the suggested materials, identify imagery and descriptive...
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Narratives
Add to the narrative writing experience. Elementary or middle school writers listen to the teacher read a descriptive passage, then reread the same passage silently. They highlight sensory details and figurative language, then orally...
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Literature of the Islands and the Sea
Students read an age-appropriate novel in which an island setting plays an important role from a provided list. This will help them understand life on an island. They will analyze the plot, theme, characterization, setting, and style...
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Friday and Friends: A Prospectus of the Mexican Family through Children's Literature
Students use literature to examine how the structure of families in Mexico has changed over time. In groups, they examine how their life now relates to their ancestors and the Spanish conquest of the area. As a class, they are read...
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Other Voices - Latino and Chicano Literature and Identity in America
Twelfth graders analyze "Dedication" and "Child of the Americas" using a double-journal format. They compare responses and infer meaning from the connotations of select images in the poems write a paragraph describing the importance of...