Curated OER
Complete Novel Guide: James and the Giant Peach
Before your class reads the book James and the Giant Peach, check out this very handy set of learning activities. The reading guide provides you with several excellent ideas for building vocabulary related to the text and reading...
Penguin Books
An Educator's Guide to Counting by 7s
Everyone takes a different journey through grief. A series of lesson plans for the novel Counting by 7s introduces readers to the main character who loses her parents in a car crash. Discussion questions and writing prompts combine...
K12 Reader
Dolphins
Dolphins are the focus of a short comprehension exercise that asks readers to identify the main idea and supporting ideas in the passage.
Fluence Learning
Writing About Literature: Comparing and Contrasting Characters in Heidi
Scholars read excerpts from the story, Heidi, in a three-part assessment that focuses on comparing and contrasting characters. Each part contains three tasks that challenge learners to discuss, answer comprehension questions,...
Wuthering Heights
The Reader’s Guide to Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights
Researching the characters, setting, and background history of a work of literature enhances interest and improves reading comprehension. An interactive website contains a wealth of resources related to Emily Bronte's novel Wuthering...
Institute for Humane Education
Not So Fair and Balanced: Analyzing Bias in the Media
Life is not always fair. Who's heard that before? This same concept moves to a larger scale using prejudice and bias. Pupils discuss where prejudice attitudes derive and how they develop throughout life. Reading comprehension...
Fabius-Pompey School District
Paired Passage Practice and the Extended Response Question
How do pupils relate paired passages to each other? Here's a resource that helps! The lesson includes a short story and a poem as a set of paired reading passages, followed by some analysis questions. It also includes an essay template...
Storytelling World
Maniac Magee
Add to children's enjoyment of the award-winning novel Maniac Magee with this fun collection of resources. From sequence of events and fact or fiction worksheets, to writing newspaper articles and creating advertisements based on the...
Curated OER
Guided Reading with Jazz Baby
Jazz music and musicians are the focus of this language arts lesson. Young readers independently read the book Jazz Baby. To build fluency and independence they read silently, but are guided by directive comments from the teacher. They...
Curated OER
Developing Listening Skills With Folktales
Students answer questions about a folktale that is read to them. In this listening skills lesson, students practice listening to folktales and answering questions about what they hear. They listen to repetitive readings of the same...
Curated OER
The Outsiders: Directed Reading Thinking Activity
It can be difficult to begin a novel when you don't know what it's about. Take the opportunity to begin S.E. Hinton's The Outsiders slowly, making predictions and answering questions about the book's first nine pages.
Curated OER
Listening and Punctuation and Grammar, oh my!
A great way to practice listening, punctuation, and proper grammar is playing this great partner activity. Learners must work together to read and write different sentences.
Curated OER
Tom Sawyer Questions: Chapters 1-13
Reading The Adventures of Tom Sawyer? Give your class a list of reading questions to guide their reading. Questions are divided into seven sections according to the chapters they accompany.
Curated OER
Story Map for Crime and Punishment Part I, Chapters 1-5
While reading chapters one through five of Crime and Punishment, focus your readers with this guide. Eight questions are given here, encouraging the reader to study the protagonist and the struggles that ensue with the surrounding...
Curated OER
Reading Meet Writing
Thinking about introducing your middle schoolers to reading log journals? Try the approach suggested by this resource. After reading to the class an article or portion of a novel, demonstrate a Think Aloud and then model how to transform...
Curated OER
The Secret to Freedom Teacher’s Guide
Students read the story "The Secret to Freedom" and participate in active reading to personalize what they have read. In this reading lesson, students follow several writing activities and discuss their work . Students integrate their...
Core Knowledge Foundation
Unit 9: The Science of Breakable Things by Tae Keller
A novel study examines The Science of Breakable Things by Tae Keller. Fifth graders participate in daily readings, discussions, and assignments following an "ask, explore, imagine, observe, and understand" routine. A final performance...
Core Knowledge Foundation
Third Grade Skills Unit 11: Introduction to Ecology
The concluding skills unit offers learning opportunities and reviews in preparation for assessments. Scholars participate in lessons that examine spelling patterns, prefixes, suffixes, pronouns, and adjectives, draft a letter, and listen...
Curated OER
Study Guide for Where the Red Fern Grows
One of the best fourth grade books of all time is Where the Red Fern Grows. Provide your class with interesting background on the book and the author as well as worksheets for every five chapters of the novel. The first part of the guide...
Curated OER
Introduce: Comprehension Strategy: Comprehension Monitoring
Help readers develop awareness of comprehension issues and employ tools for better understanding. The best way to begin this strategy is to model it through a think aloud. Choose a book scholars will also be reading, preferably one they...
Curated OER
Briar Rose: Anticipation Guide
Prepare your readers for Briar Rose with an Anticipation Guide that asks them to agree or disagree with a series of statements that reflect issues raised by Jane Yolen’s narrative about a young girl’s research into her grandmother’s...
Curated OER
Flipped: Anticipation Guide Instructions
Encourage text-to-self connections with a prereading strategy designed for Flipped. Clear steps are included, and the actual anticipation guide is the final page of the three-page packet. Ten statements are provided, and class members...
Curated OER
Anticipation Guide for Much Ado About Nothing
Is falling in love easy or hard? Challenge your class to consider seven statements about love and relationships before reading Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing. Then, as you work your way through the play, revisit the sheet to record...
Utah Education Network (UEN)
Reflective Listening Skills
Do you ever feel like your conversation partner is just nodding along as you speak? Encourage teenagers to become reflective listeners with a short activity in which they form responses to assertive statements to reflect what the speaker...