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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Details, Details, Details

For Teachers 3rd - 8th Standards
Writing can become one-dimensional if authors don't involve all their senses. First, scholars observe a strange object which, ideally, they can touch and even smell. Without using certain words (you can create a list or have the class...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Come To Your Senses

For Teachers 3rd - 4th Standards
Write narratives that include ideas, observations, or memories of an event or experience, and be sure to use concrete sensory details! Groups utilize a few of the famous I Spy books in order to create narratives that utilize sensory...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

"Snapshot" Exercises & Sensory Detail Word Bank

For Teachers 2nd - 12th
Read a sample of creative descriptive writing to your science class. Discuss how writing can be used to record and communicate observations that scientists make. Reading selections and thought-provoking questions are suggested. Also...
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Lesson Plan
K20 LEARN

Who's Coming To Dinner? Descriptive Writing

For Teachers 8th Standards
"The Dinner Party" is the anchor text in a lesson designed to encourage writers to use sensory details in their stories. After brainstorming descriptive words and phrases for the five senses, class members read Mona Gardner's stark tale...
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Lesson Plan
EngageNY

Learning to Observe Closely and Record Accurately: How to Create a Field Journal

For Teachers 5th Standards
Look carefully. Scholars practice observing and recording the natural world around them by looking out a window or viewing an image. Learners discuss how their experience compares to that of Meg Lowman in The Most Beautiful Roof in the...
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Lesson Plan
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Curated OER

Let's Go Exploring!

For Teachers K - 12th Standards
Use a Courbet painting of a cave or tunnel opening to reinforce the importance of descriptive writing. Writers of all ages use sensory details to describe what the scene depicts as they pretend to be in the painting. Then they imagine...
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Lesson Plan
Captain Planet Foundation

Sense of Place

For Teachers K
Explore the five senses with a kindergarten lesson on gardening. After taking a walk through the class garden, kids note what they see, hear, feel, taste, and smell, and then decide what is living in the garden versus what is not living....
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Lesson Plan
Space Race

Sensory Detectives

For Teachers Pre-K - 2nd Standards
Test your learners' sensory awareness with three hands-on activities that ask pupils to use their other senses to identify and describe everyday objects hidden from sight.  
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Lesson Plan
Berkshire Museum

Nature Journaling: Experience the Outdoors Through Writing and Drawing

For Teachers 2nd - 5th Standards
Step into the great outdoors and develop young scientists' skills of observation with a nature journaling lesson. Given a specific focus or goal, children practice making and recording observations of nature through written descriptions...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Language Arts: Telling a Painting's Story

For Teachers 7th - 12th
Use art museum paintings as inspiration for your class's creative writing works. Observing the paintings closely, middle and high schoolers list details and write descriptions. Their completed stories are displayed on bulletin boards...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Sensory Details

For Teachers K - 2nd
Students observe their environment and write detailed, sensory-specific sentences about that environment. This activity can be extended to include the creation of a personalized story or movie of the experience (student examples are...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

From Light to Dark and Back

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Experiment with light and dark in a series of interactive activities that lead up to reading and writing poetry. Class members have the opportunity to observe their feelings while sitting in the light and dark and to play with shadow...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Give Me Five!

For Teachers K
Students become familiar with their five senses and how their experiences would change without them.  In this observations instructional activity, students observe using their five senses in a garden.  Students illustrate what they've...
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Lesson Plan
EngageNY

Writing Narratives from First Person Point of View: Imagining Meg Lowman’s Rainforest Journal

For Teachers 5th Standards
I spy with my little eye! Learners observe page 23 in The Most Beautiful Roof in the World and practice what they would add to a field journal. They discuss how details from the text help add to their thoughts. To finish, readers use...
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Lesson Plan
University of Minnesota

Mirroring Emotions

For Teachers 9th - 12th
Do you ever give your class the "teacher look"? Without saying a word, they become silent and engaged (hopefully). How do they know what you're thinking? Explore the concept of nonverbal communication and how it relates to our mirror...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Essential Elements of Habitat

For Teachers 1st
First graders compare their local area with the Belize landscape. They construct maps of the school area, adding descriptive information. They write haiku poems about their favorite outside places.
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Organizer
Memorial Art Gallery

Learning to Look, Looking to Learn - Peeling Onions

For Students 9th - 12th
Lilly Martin Spencer's "Peeling Onions" is the subject of a series of exercises that model for learners how to use the elements of art to read a painting. A series of worksheets focus viewers' attention on how Spencer uses color and...
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Lesson Plan
University of Minnesota

Chemotaxis Using C. elegans

For Teachers 5th - 8th
Have you ever wondered what roundworms are like? Or what they don't like? Explore the sensory preferences of C. elegans through this controlled chemotaxis experiment. Biology class members brainstorm what substances might attract—or...
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Unit Plan
Academy of American Poets

Noticing Poetry

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
Introduce scholars to the "I Notice" method, a different approach to studying poetry. Instructors first model the noticing method by identifying words and images that appeal on the sonic level, the ideational level, the sensory level,...
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Organizer
Curated OER

Writing Organizers

For Teachers 5th - 12th
Eight graphic organizers to choose from? That's right! Each of these organizers relates to writing or reading. From narrowing a writing topic, to responding to literature, to planning a writing project, you'll find many purposes for...
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Lesson Plan
Polar Trec

Identifying Sea Ice

For Teachers 6th - 8th Standards
Sea ice contains 17 sub-types based on age and various characteristics. Scholars observe ice floating in a simulated ocean and record their observations. Then, they view photographs of different types of sea ice and learn to...
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Lesson Plan
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Rainforest Alliance

Knowing the Essential Elements of a Habitat

For Teachers 1st Standards
To gain insight into the many different types of habitats, individuals must first get to know their own. Here, scholars explore their school environment, draw a map, compare and contrast their surroundings to larger ones. They then write...
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Unit Plan
Trinity University

Framing Poetry

For Teachers 9th - 12th Standards
The big idea in this poetry unit plan is that structure and content work together to create meaning. Class members learn how to identify and mark the metrical patterns and line lengths used in poems. They study the structure of various...
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Lesson Plan
Curated OER

A Sense of Place

For Teachers 6th - 12th
Learners read "Fish Tale: Falling For a Live One" from The New York Times and discuss the methods and techniques the writer uses to create a strong mental image. Students pick a place in their community they wish to write about and...