The New York Times
Writing Fiction Based on Real Science - NYTimes.com
Refuse to alienate your scientific-minded young scholars during your creative writing unit. Learners explore how literary writing can reflect observable fact, and be based in actual science. The links include examples of fiction and...
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Chinese Minority Cultures
Seventh graders identify the elements that characterize culture in literature.
Students analyze the representation of Chinese minority peoples
through textbooks. Students identify and interpret the differences among the people of China.
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Comparing and Contrasting Fiction and Nonfiction Using Graphic Organizers
Students compare and contrast fiction and non-fiction selections. In this writing skills activity, students use different forms of graphic organizers to compare "The Three Little Pigs," to Wiesel's Night.
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Writing Process- Expository Writing
Expository writing is the focus of the language arts lesson plan presented here. In it, young writers review what expository writing is through a class discussion and teacher demonstration. Then, learners write expository text that...
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A River Ran Wild: An Environmental History
The Nashua River serves as the focal point of an investigation of the treatment of and care for natural resources. A reading of A River Rand Wild: An Environmental History by Lynne Cherry, launches the study and class members consider...
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Story Scrapbook
Students develop a comparison worksheet using one non fiction book and one fiction book they have read to be put into a class scrapbook. In their comparison students must have title, author, point of view, setting, characters, and other...
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School-Home Links: Fiction
For this fiction book worksheet, students read a book that is about make-believe people or animals and their lives. Students then write three things about the story that are make-believe. Parents or guardians must sign the worksheet.
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Book Review
Students write a five paragraph theme that explains how the novel which they read in this unit effectively utilized various literary elements to portray the impact of a disease on a population. They then decide which three literary...
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Reader's Review
Students create booklets to provide information on elements of a novel, including plot, setting, character, major and minor conflicts and theme.
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Establish the Theme
Second graders explore the topic of nature. In this detective lesson, 2nd graders review non-fiction materials on nature and identify text, headings, diagrams, graphs, to establish the theme of the book.
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Picture This
Students explore finding facts from the Internet to create a nonfiction story. In this writing lesson plan, students fill out KWL charts and do internet research about the given topic of spiders. Students then create and...
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Creating Comic Strips
Young scholars recognize the elements needed to create a comic strip. In this comic strip instructional activity, student understand that comic strips need words and pictures. Students find differences and similarities in comic strips....
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Trouble With Trolls
Students listen to The Trouble With Trolls and discuss fables. In this story elements lesson, students work on reading skills. Students participate in different reading activities.
National First Ladies' Library
Writing (and Rewriting!) History
Middle schoolers differentiate between fiction and non-fiction, discuss historical fiction, which combines both genres, choose historical novel from list and read independently, and write original short stories that combine elements of...
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Time to Read
High schoolers identify how the literary elements of theme, point of view, characterization, setting, and plot illustrate the effects of a certain disease on a community. They identify the aspects of the book that are specific to the...
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Teaching Language Arts in Kindergarten Using Stories, Aesop's Fables, and Tall Tales
Students search into a variety of story elements in the eight lessons of this unit. The title, author, illustrator, setting, main character, problem, solution, events and the story are the components of the lessons.
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Inventing and Presenting Unit 1: Analyzing Nonfiction and Inventing Solutions
Middle schoolers read about and identify patterns in the invention process. Students discuss and write about information learned from research. Middle schoolers compile a list of problems, choose one, write a problem statement, and...
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Poetry Book
Pupils study the following terms and concepts: word choice, dialect, invented words, concrete terms, abstract terms, figurative and sensory language. In cooperative groups, they select three of the terms, research them, and pick poems...
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I Hate My Sibling?
Third graders read the book Jacob Have I Loved, then ask themselves whether they can truly hate their siblings.
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Titanic
Students conduct research with the purpose of writing a report about the Titanic. They use a variety of resources. The students produce a written document that has plenty of documented information. They also compare the information that...
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Cooperative Jigsaw Expert Report of Fables
Pupils research literary elements of fables. In this literature instructional activity, students analyze literary elements of fables. Pupils work collaboratively using a jigsaw strategy to analyze literary elements.
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If These Walls Could Talk: Seeing a Culture Through Human Features
Pupils read Talking Walls and discuss the walls presented and their importance to the culture. In this geography lesson, students locate and label each country/continent discussed in the book on a world map. Pupils take a walk and point...
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Flat Stanley Guided Reading
Second graders listen to their teacher read the book, "Flat Stanley". They relate the activities in the book to activities in their own life. They can also create their own pictures of Stanley.
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Loving Literature
First graders, after having "Are You My Mother?" by P.D. Eastman read to them, participate in group discussions or independentally work to analyze a spreadsheet to identify essential elements in the story and graph their data. In...