Ontario
Reading Informational Text
Learning to recognize the importance of the features of information text (i.e., titles, subtitles, endnotes, sidebars, etc.) is the focus of a reading activity designed for middle schoolers. Learners examine how these text features...
Curated OER
Waterfalls
Third graders practice identifying the main idea and supporting details when reading informational text. They read text related to waterfalls and practice note taking skills to identify critical details. Students use their notes to...
Curated OER
WRITING AN ARTICLE FOR A CHILDREN'S MAGAZINE
Students engage in the writing of a magazine article. They focus upon the reading of a children's fiction book and create an informative narrative. They create main ideas and supporting details for the article. The supporting of main...
Curated OER
Taking Action Against Child Labour
Learners identify and clarify a problem, issue or inquiry, locate and record information from a variety of sources and identify alternative interpretations from specific historical and contemporary sources. They asses at least two...
Curated OER
Gathering, Evaluating, And Organizing Information for a Report
Students gather and organize information for a research report on a topic of their choosing. Each students selects a subject for their research. Using traditional and electronic data they reference four or more appropriate resources...
Curated OER
Focusing with Anticipation Guides
Learners write with a sharp, distinct focus identifying topic, task and audience. They discuss anticipatory statements with supporting details. Students create an essential question at the beginning of a composition, novel, or unit.
National Endowment for the Humanities
Faulkner's As I Lay Dying: Burying Addie's Voice
Students explore the use of voice and title in William Faulkner's, "As I Lay Dying". They identify and discuss the use of image, symbols and narrative voice in the story.
Hawaiʻi State Department of Education
Finding the Main Idea
You can mix almost any subject with an arts curriculum. Find out how to use drama to find the main idea of a literary text. You'll read a story, and then learners will make tableaus showing what happened, or what they think will happen...
Curated OER
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...
Curated OER
My Dream Job
Students write a research paper about their dream job. They organize their paper using research notes, and support their main idea with supporting details.
Curated OER
In Search of Food...Living Off the Vegetation
Fourth graders locate information to describe what Indians gathered and how they sustained life. They use 5 resources, select a paragraph from each and state the main idea and supporting details.
Curated OER
Lost Worlds
Students, while using the strategy of identifying the main idea and supporting details, explore the three nonfiction selections of the lost worlds of Machu Picchu high in the Andes Mountains, Great Zimbabwe, and Anasazi. In addition,...
Curated OER
Organizing Ideas
High schoolers organize facts into categories and list the structure of a five-paragraph essay. They identify the main idea and outline the supporting details. In the class, students discuss how they organized their ideas and begin...
Curated OER
¿Por qué es importante el Servicio Comunitario?
Why is it important to do community service? Read these paragraphs to discover Barack Obama and Joe Biden's stance on community service. After reading the difficult text, high schoolers must identify the principal idea and decide their...
Missouri Department of Elementary
Acting Out Respect
Bert and Ernie, Lucy and Ethel ... what makes a great friend? Pupils first learn about the STAR method of problem solving: Stop, Think, Act, Review. Small groups then role play various scenarios to demonstrate respect and compromise in...
Curated OER
Running the Road to ABC
Second graders, while reading and discussing the book, "The Best Older Sister," by Sook Nyul Choi, practices predicting the meaning of a passage based on its title and illustrations. They experience determining the main idea from text...
Teach Engineering
Straw Bridges
Pairs work as engineering teams to design and build model bridges from drinking straws and tape. In this third segment in a series of 10, teams compete in an attempt to build the strongest bridge. To help with the design, the groups...
Curated OER
CAN WE SWITCH GENDERS OF STORY CHARACTERS?
Analyze characters and stories to identify stereotyping. Learners will examine the concept of character gender to evaluate bias in classroom story books. They are asked to read a story or play and change the gender of the character to...
Civil War Trust
Civil War Play
Raise the curtain to a class play that depicts the Civil War through both factual information and literary devices. The performance showcases the Battle of Antietam (Battle of Sharpsburg) and brings attention to women's roles,...
Curated OER
Lesson 3: Branches of Government
Young historians climb through the three branches of the US government in the third instructional activity of this five-part series. While reading the first three Articles of the Constitution in small groups, children write facts on...
California Academy of Science
Tropical Belt
Where in the world is the equator? Explore a world map with your class, coloring in oceans, continents, and rainforests while locating the three major lines of latitude: the equator, Tropic of Cancer, and Tropic of Capricorn. Discuss how...
National Gallery of Canada
Shadow Chasers!
Experiment with light and shadow with a photography lesson. Learners first view several artistic photographs. They then play with different levels of light and various objects, eventually putting together compositions and taking pictures...
Federal Reserve Bank
Little Nino's Pizzeria
Engage your youngsters in basic economics by connecting the terms to dessert and pizza! After a discussion about intermediate goods and natural resources, learners read and connect a pizzeria to economic terms.
National Gallery of Canada
The Tools of Perspective
Make a study of perspective in the real world. Learners examine and discuss works of art that show examples of perspective before trying their own hands at it. Using a grid drawn on transparent paper, class members transfer a view from a...