The New York Times
Decision Point: Understanding the U.S.’s Dilemma Over North Korea
Simulate the Situation Room and analyze the US's relationship with North Korea. The plan starts off with a quick review and an examination of a online timeline that updates as the situation continues. Next, the class reads an article and...
Curated OER
Great Expectations: After Reading Strategy
Class members are asked to consider how they would respond to situations faced by characters in Great Expectations. After completing one exercise as guided practice, individuals are presented with a second problematic situation and...
The New York Times
Collateral Damage? Researching a Connection Between Video Games and Violence
Hook your class into an exploration of and discussion about violence in video games with a cute animal clip and a video game trailer. After a quick discussion about how media can affect mood, class members read a related article and...
Penguin Books
A Teacher’s Guide to the Penguin Edition of John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath
The dry Oklahoma landscape in America's Dust Bowl sent many farmers in search of the promised land. A teacher's guide to John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath discusses the characters' desire for a better home along with other themes and...
Anti-Defamation League
Columbus Day or Indigenous Peoples Day?
"Columbus Day"? Indigenous Peoples' Day"? "Native Americans' Day"? The controversy over what to call the federal holiday celebrated on the second Monday in October is the focus of a lesson that asks high schoolers to consider various...
K12 Reader
Antonyms are Opposites
Knowing the opposite of your chosen word is a great step in improving your word choice. Young readers select an antonym from the provided word bank to complete a series of 14 sentences.
National Council for the Social Studies
Analyzing a Product or Political Advertisement
How do advertisements evoke specific thoughts and feelings? Class members find out through the exploration of the Internet, videos, television, magazines, radio, and posters. Learners investigate commercial advertisements, political...
Polar Trec
Polar Detectives: Using Ice Core Data to Decode Past Climate Mysteries
How does examining an ice core tell us about weather? Learners set up and explore fake ice cores made of sugar, salt, and ash to represent historical snowfall and volcanic eruptions. From their setups, scholars determine what caused the...
Polar Trec
What Can We Learn from Sediments?
Varve: a deposit of cyclical sediments that help scientists determine historical climates. Individuals analyze the topography of a region and then study varve datasets from the same area. Using this information, they determine the...
Polar Trec
Sea Ice Impact
The arctic seas contain currents that are both warm (with high salinity) and cold (relatively fresh water) that circulate throughout the year. Through discussion, a lab, and a web quest, participants explore the impacts of melting and...
Chicago Botanic Garden
Are Global CO2 Levels Changing?
According to the Mauna Loa observatory, carbon dioxide levels increased by 3 ppm in our atmosphere between 2015–2016. Individuals analyze carbon dioxide data from around the world and then share this with a home group in lesson three of...
Library of Congress
Uncle Tom’s Cabin and the Fugitive Slave Act
From the time of its publication, Uncle Tom's Cabin has been controversial. To better understand the debate, class members first examine a broadside decrying the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, and then two newspaper reviews of the novel...
California Department of Education
Workplace Skills
What skills do employers look for in potential employees? Introduce scholars to the skills that pay the bills during the second of six career and college readiness lesson plans. Once they have defined critical 21st-century skills, groups...
Reading Through History
Ain't I a Woman?
Sojourner Truth’s “Ain’t I a Woman?” speech has reverberated through American history, giving voice to women of color who had not previously been heard. Learners analyze the tone, audience, purpose, occasion, and speaker of the speech’s...
National Gallery of Art
Van Gogh’s Self-Portraits
Scholars get to know famous Dutch painter, Vincent van Gogh, as an artist as well as a person. After reading personal letters and analyzing paintings, participants paint two self-portraits that represent their personality. Then, write a...
Curated OER
Shizuko’s Daughter: List-Group-Label Strategy
Help your learners navigate the vocabulary of Shizuko's Daughter by Kyoko Mori with a lesson on categorizing words. After coming up with a list of things that grow from the earth, learners decide which categories each words belong in.
Curated OER
Excerpt from Elizabeth Gaskell's Mary Barton (1848)
Answering document-based questions is a great way to build reading comprehension and critical thinking skills. Learners read an excerpt from Elizabeth Gaskell's Mary Barton, then answer two related questions.
Curated OER
Introduce: Fact and Opinion
Build reading comprehension and critical-thinking skills as learners focus on discerning fact from opinion. First, introduce the two terms as you test prior knowledge and explain their meanings (there is a scripted explanation here for...
Curated OER
ABO Blood Types Worksheet
Blood types and transfusions are explained in reading passages at the top of the learning exercise. A chart of blood type compatibility is also provided. Biology students answer comprehension questions and then exercise critical-thinking...
Curated OER
Thinking Skills: Connecting shapes
In this thinking skills instructional activity, learners draw a line connecting each blue figure without touching any other color. Students connect 4 figures.
Curated OER
Read (or Scroll) All About It!
Students compare written headlines found in print and online news sources while using The New York Times. They conduct research with the top stories from the newspaper and have discussion that involves critical thinking skills.
Curated OER
The Lord of the Flies by William Golding
Tenth graders read and analyze the novel Lord of the Flies by William Golding. They examine the setting, plot, and climax in the novel. Character descriptions, good, evil symbolic images within characters are dissected in detail with...
Curated OER
Population Vs Consumption: Which is a Bigger Problem for the Environment & Who is Getting the Lion's Share of the World's Resources?
Students develop critical thinking and awareness about the complexity of natural resource use, wealth distribution, population densities, poverty, and the environment. They think about people living in different parts of the world and...
Curated OER
It's A Mystery To Me
Students become both mystery readers and writers. They utilize the Internet to understand the elements of this classic genre; employ critical thinking skills when reading various stories in both print and electronic formats; form groups...