Curated OER
Preparing for High School and Beyond
Eighth graders might be intimidated about going to high school and they may not think they'll ever go to college. Ease those fears while making college readiness an eighth grade reality. In teams, pupils fill out several worksheets while...
Curated OER
The Rule of Law
Students continue their exploration of the concept of rule of law. As a class, they discuss how Civil Rights leaders followed the rule of law in their protests. After reading various articles, they participate in a discussion and...
Curated OER
Weapons in school: Protection or danger?
Students write an editorial (staff opinion) or commentary (writer's opinion) if they/he or she believe the school rules are either too strict or too lenient when addressing weapons possession. Students research past situations in their...
PBS
Constitution Day
Travel back to 1787 as young scholars investigate the creation of the US Constitution. After first working in small groups to create sets of classroom rules, learners go on to read a summary of the Constitution and watch a short video...
National First Ladies' Library
Women's Lives in the Victorian Era
The lives of middle-class Victorian women were circumscribed by strict standards that governed all aspects of behavior. To gain a better understanding of the Victorian Ideals for women, class members research the life of a middle-class...
Curated OER
Colonial Rules
How did Colonists react to British rule prior to the American Revolution? Give your high schoolers a taste of oppression with this role-play activity, then let them come up with a revolution of their own. This excercise is intended to...
Bright Hub Education
Writing Effective Dialogue
Wait, there is an effective way to practice writing dialogue with your high school class? Great! High schoolers will have a blast writing dialogue using a list of potentially silly situations and an image of people talking. Employ the...
Overcoming Obstacles
Setting Expectations
Learning to work together respectfully is one of those life skills learned through practice. The second lesson in the series has groups attempt to complete an activity and then discuss the obstacles they faced. Using what they learned in...
Curated OER
Breaking News: School Bans Hugging and High Fives
Learners explore current events by analyzing a news article in class. In this school ban activity, students read a story about a high school in London that has banned physical contact between all learners. Students answer study questions...
Social Media Toolbox
About Facebook
If everyone is on Facebook, should the school's news publication be as well? Scholars study a social media giant in the 11th lesson from The Social Media Toolbox's 16-part series. The activity combines individual study and collaboration...
Constitutional Rights Foundation
Plyler v. Doe: Can States Deny Public Benefits to Illegal Immigrants?
Illegal immigration is an ever-changing source of consistent controversy. A reading passage about the rights of undocumented workers and illegal immigrants—and the lack thereof—guides high schoolers into a mock trial activity. Three...
Teach Engineering
Discovering Phi: The Golden Ratio
Fe, phi, fo, fum. This activity leads pairs to find the ratio of consecutive terms of the Fibonacci sequence. The pairs find that the Fibonacci sequence can be found in many places. A discussion with the class shows that the ratios...
American Psychological Association
Research Ethics
Psychologists designing experiments to research human behavior must consider weighty ethical concerns. Class members act as members of an institutional review board and examine proposals to determine whether included provisions...
Curated OER
Building Relationships in a High School Classroom
Students explore building new friendships during the first week of school. They participate in a variety of getting to know each other activities. Students work cooperatively and develop collegial relationships with their classmates.
Curated OER
Spelling, Capitalization, and Punctuation
Elementary schoolers explore writing conventions. First they play a ball toss game to practice spelling high frequency words. (A link to a 2nd grade list is attached.) The class works together to correct spelling, punctuation, and...
Curated OER
A Question of Faith?
Should organized prayer be prohibited at high school sporting events? Students explore their own feelings about prayer in school-sponsored events, before discussing the recent Supreme Court decision banning public prayer at high school...
Nemours KidsHealth
Water Safety: Grades 9-12
Make a big splash with a lesson about water safety. After reading three articles related to water safety, high schoolers first choose one water safety rule to research and write a report summarizing their findings. They then use an...
Curated OER
Topical Discussions
Engaging in topical discussions can be a great way to teach kids how to build strong arguments and support their opinions with concrete evidence. High schoolers choose a controversial topic, build an argument for or against that topic,...
Beyond Benign
Solubility
Enhance your class' ability to understand solubility. Science scholars examine how temperature and concentration affect solubility using an interesting lab experiment. The introduction and procedure also discuss the relationship between...
Overcoming Obstacles
Communicating Constructively
Some conversations are easy and enjoyable, while others are horrific! To begin a lesson on communicating constructively, class members list examples of conversations that are easy, average, and those that are difficult and identify what...
EngageNY
Integer Sequences—Should You Believe in Patterns?
Help your class discover possible patterns in a sequence of numbers and then write an equation with a lesson that covers sequence notation and function notation. Graphs are used to represent the number patterns.
Foreign Policy Research Institute
Propaganda - 9/11 and the War on Terrorism
Propaganda is an important topic that most high school social studies teachers address. Here, students compare and contrast methods of public persuasion during WWII with those used in the contemporary War on Terror. Research, discussion,...
NOAA
Introduction to the Ocean Sciences
Engage your class with a mock National Ocean Sciences Bowl. The first installment of a 23-part NOAA Enrichment in Marine sciences and Oceanography (NEMO) program provides an introduction to the ocean sciences, as well as to the rules of...
Channel Islands Film
Island Rotation: Lesson Plan 4
Foster's Rule? Allopatric speciation? After watching West of the West's documentary Island Rotation, class members use Venn diagrams to compare endemic species on the Channel Islands with mainland related species. They then create a...