Teaching Tolerance
Journalism for Justice
Roll the presses! Or at least have your class members participate in the time-honored tradition of the student press by creating their own newspapers or journalist pieces on a social problem. After conducting research and collaborating...
California Education Partners
Animals of Rhomaar
Investigate the growth rates of alien animals. Pupils study fictional animals from another planet to determine how much they grow per year. The investigators plot the growth of their animals over a period of time and then compare them to...
Curated OER
To Whom It May Concern
Fourth graders produce and peer edit typed rough drafts of the business letters following the guidelines illustrated in the Eight Essential Parts of a business letter and save to disks. They complete the Where's the Math? scavenger hunt...
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The Color of Poetry
Learners listen to a story about colors and then write their own color poems.
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Personalized Postcards
Students create and send postcards to friends and family members. Using actual photographs, they write a rough draft and final draft of a paragraph and print it out to glue onto a postcard template to mail to their friend or family member.
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WH AT' S Y O U R A M B I T I O N?
High schoolers read and analyze an excerpt from Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain. Students use the Six Traits of Writing to compose an essay on a personal life ambition that each high schoolers may have. Students use prewriting...
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Setting Goals for Success
Students construct SMART goals. In this goal-setting lesson, students discover how to write a SMART goal for their student portfolios. Working in pairs students write short-term goals that will build towards a long-term goal.
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Creating Hate: The Power of Words
Students explore why authors choose to use hate words in literature. In this power of words lesson, students complete group participation, journal entries, and written assignments to investigate the use of inflammatory language. Students...
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Details, Details, Details
Students add details to their writing. In this language arts lesson, students use details to enhance their writing. Students view a picture and write a paragraph about what they see. Students conference with another student to edit their...
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KG Lesson Plan
Eighth graders explore the four major components of an autobiography. As they discuss the major characteristics of an autobiography, 8th graders list the advantages and disadvantages of traditional, word of mouth, tales. Individually,...
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A Water Droplet's Experience in the Hydrologic Cycle
Students write a story from the perspective of a water droplet on a journey through the water cycle. They use the 6+1 Traits writing method to focus on voice in the writing as they create characters that their water droplet has...
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Color Poems
Pupils listen as the teacher reads several poems from the book "Hailstones and Halibut Bones," "My Many Colored Days," and a teacher created poem. Students choose a color and share some brainstorming ideas with the class. They write a...
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Opposites Attract
Students demonstrate the attraction of small pieces of paper to a charged plastic rod and conduct experiment with other objects to determine whether they can hold a charge. They then use online applets to apply their experiments to...
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Sidewalks to Success in Middle School
Students write a brochure that educates incoming middle school students on how to succeed.
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Sami and the Time of Troubles
Students read Florence Parry Heide and Judith Heide Gilliland's, Sami and the Time of Troubles before discussing it as a class. They brainstorm ideas for a letter to the main character, Sami. Next, they write a rough draft of a letter to...
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Autobiographical Talking Sticks
Students begin the lesson by developing a map of their lives. Individually, they take this information and write a personal narrative. They create symbols to represent the various times in their lives and introduce them into their...
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Novel Analysis
High schoolers read the novel, Lord of the Flies, then write an essay analyzing the novel. They analyze, in small groups, characters, plot, setting, style, symbolism, theme, critical responses, and historical influences
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Applying for a Job
Students apply for a job and create a resume. In this applying for a job lesson, students write a resume for themselves. Resume is designed for real world application.
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Connecting Characters and Themes in Julius Caesar
Fourth graders prepare for the literary analysis. They locate, interpret, evaluate and analyze the relationship between a character and the theme. After a lecture/demo, 4th graders write topic and detail sentences, then correctly put...
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Essay on Themes
Students read the book THE CALL OF THE WILD by Jack London and discuss the different elements in the book. They then write an essay on a theme providing examples backing up their main point of their essay.
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Other Faces of Discrimination
High schoolers explore the bullying experienced by those who graduated from one-room school houses to large high schools. In this discrimination instructional activity, high schoolers read the 2 provided handouts on the topic and then...
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Baby Cell Facts of Life
Students examine the roles of an animal cell's parts, how each part relates to one another and then demonstrate their knowledge by writing a story about the animal cell structure.
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Preposition Pizazz
Students examine examples of poems and identify the prepositions in them. They write original poems using prepositional phrases and create illustrations to go with them.
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Memory of a Kiss
Third graders read, discuss, and memorize the poem "Jenny Kissed Me." as an example of lyrical poetry. They write a letter to Jenny reliving the memory of her kiss from an elderly person's point of view. They illustrate their poems.