University of North Carolina
Application Essays
There's a lot riding on good writing! Often, an application essay is the difference between acceptance and rejection. As part of a series on specific writing assignments and contexts, a handout helps scholars craft the perfect personal...
Curated OER
Writing to Learn History: Annotations and Mini-Writes
Students use their critical thinking skills to write about historical events. In this historical perspectives lesson, students read documents about historical events and make annotations and marginal notes. Students then respond to...
California Education Partners
Frog and Toad Together by Arnold Lobel
A three-part assessment tests scholars' reading and writing capabilities. Young readers listen to and read an excerpt from Frog and Toad Together by Arnold Lobel. After drawing pictures of what is memorable, learners discuss their notes...
Virginia Department of Education
Attributes of a Rectangular Prism
A change is coming. Pupils use unit cubes to investigate how changes in the length, width, and/or height affects volume and surface area. They extend the results to write and test predictions on the effect of changing multiple sides on...
California Education Partners
Bud Not Buddy
A two-day assessment challenges scholars to read an excerpt from the story, Bud Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis then complete a series of exercises in preparation for a writing assignment. Day one includes an independent reading...
English Worksheets Land
Blaze a Trail
Compare and contrast different ways that sources present information with a reading worksheet. After readers view two short passages about blazing a trail, they note the information they found in each selection.
New York State Education Department
Comprehensive English Examination: August 2015
Looking at literature through a critical lens helps readers connect the text to the larger world. An essay examining the theme "There is no ill in the world without a remedy" forms the main part of a sample comprehensive English...
K5 Learning
Musical Instruments to Play
Bring some music to your language arts lesson with a reading comprehension activity. Learners read an informational passage about different musical instruments before answering a series of comprehension and vocabulary questions.
Everything Homeschooling
Biography Worksheet
Gathering information about a person is the easy part. Crafting an interesting biography is another thing altogether. The value in this information-collecting worksheet is that writers are asked to move beyond the usual basic questions.
Curriculum Corner
Convince Me!
With the help of six graphic organizers, writers share their opinion on a bad habit, the greatest city, a desirable pet, a recommended book, and the importance of education. Using their supporting reasons and facts, pupils use the blank...
Curriculum Corner
Guest Teacher Plans: Grade 3
Always be prepared for a substitute teacher with a daily plan equipped with an assortment of activities that cover third grade math, reading, word work, and writing.
Curated OER
Graphic Novel Writing Workshop
Khaled Hosseini’s video “Using Real People and Events” motivates learners to reflect on their own experiences and to use those experiences as the basis of a graphic novel that expresses a universal truth. The richly detailed plan...
Anti-Defamation League
Impact of the U.S. Expansion on Indigenous People and Stereotypes About Native American People
The 2004 U.S. bicentennial sparks a discussion about its meaning and importance to United States history. Readings, maps, tables, and reflective writing prompt small groups to explore the westward expansion, Lewis and Clark, and how...
Curated OER
Narrative Writing
Students complete activities to learn narrative writing. In this narrative writing lesson plan students are given writing prompts in order to better understand how to write in a narrative format.
Curated OER
Writing Exercise: Ancient Sumer
When summer is over, it's time to get started on Sumer! Get your scholars writing about Ancient Sumer civilizations in this exercise, which features five short-answer prompts. Writers will describe Fertile Crescent Geography, compare and...
Curated OER
Writing Lesson 13
Fourth graders practice responding to a writing prompt and practice proofreading. They write three paragraphs explaining good classroom rules and tell why each of three rules is a good one. Each paragraph should have at least three...
Curated OER
Prom king...or not?
Students conduct research on issues and interests by generating ideas and questions and by posing problems. They gather, evaluate and synthesize data from a variety of sources (e.g., print and non-print texts, artifacts, people) to...
Polk Bros Foundation
Meet the Nonfiction Main Idea Challenge
Help your class develop the ability to determine a main idea with a packet of materials that you can introduce and use over a period of time. The packet includes some information for the teacher and rationale for the exercises. There are...
Weebly
Holocaust Diary Project
Here is a good interdisciplinary project that combines creative and narrative writing with studies of the Holocaust. Your young historians will compose a diary of experiences from the perspective of an individual living during the time...
Scholastic
Marijuana: Breaking Down the Buzz
Teenagers get the real information about marijuana use based on the history of tobacco legislation and research. As they read an educational passage about marijuana laws, science, and changing attitudes, they address their preconceptions...
College Board
2007 AP® English Literature and Composition Free-Response Questions
Scholars use the 2007 AP® English Literature and Composition Free-Response Questions to write essays examining how a character's tie to the past affects the story. The resource also requires pupils to write essays comparing two related...
Curated OER
Knowing Write from Wrong
Explore how the informality of electronic correspondence has affected communications in the workplace. Writers develop pages for a basic writing guide that contains rules and examples to help correct common writing errors. A great way to...
Curated OER
Fluency Passages, 3rd Grade
What would it be like to travel in a covered wagon? Learn about the life of a pioneer with a short informational reading passage. Kids read four paragraphs about traveling in a covered wagon and how it is different than traveling today,...
Curriculum Corner
First Day News
There is so much to take in on the first day of school! Here, have scholars write about it. Pupils detail their teacher's name, something they've learned, how they feel, who their classmates are, what they want to remember, and what they...