Curated OER
Blending Bumper Cars
First graders practice blending words with the consonant-vowel-consonant pattern. Given a card with a decodable word part, 1st graders add an initial consonant sound and blend the sounds to read the new word. They practice reading a...
Curated OER
Being in the Noh: An Introduction to Japanese Noh Plays
Young scholars read a Japanese Noh play and discuss its structure and traditional characters. They choose a short myth and write a Noh play based on it.
Curated OER
Good vs. Evil
Make a study of good and evil by examining a short legend. After reading, learners compose their own stories and participate in a class discussion about the text, the characters, and the message of the reading.
Curated OER
Feelings From A to Z
Third graders create a class A to Z Feelings book to explore emotions, discover new words, pose for a "feeling" icture, and write about the feeling.
Curated OER
Shizuko’s Daughter: Discussion Web
Is Yuki a selfish character? Analyze her motivation and behavior during a unit on Shizuko's Daughter by Kyoko Mori. Readers fill out two sides of a graphic organizer with reasons why or why not she is selfish, and then come up with a...
Curated OER
Elements of a Short Story
Students analyze elements of a short story by working together. In this literature lesson, students analyze short stories. They use the TI Navigator Application to write their findings.
Curated OER
Comparison and Contrast - D.H. Lawrence
Students explore "The Rocking Horse Winner" and "The Horse Dealer's Daughter" by D. H. Lawrence. In this literature lesson, students read these short stories. Students write an essay comparing the two stories according to themes,...
Curated OER
Writing A Summary
Middle schoolers read short stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and write summaries. In this summary writing lesson plan, middle schoolers discuss how to write a summary. Middle schoolers then select a topic and practice writing using...
Curated OER
Justice for All
A reading of Roald Dahl’s Lamb to the Slaughter opens a discussion of justice and fairness. Using a Venn diagram and an Idea Wheel graphic organizer, class members consider the similarities and differences in these two terms. They then...
Curated OER
So Much Depends Upon...Sixteen-Word Imagery Poems Inspired by Love that Dog by Sharon Creech
After reading Love That Dog by Sharon Creech (and possibly shedding a few tears), middle schoolers work on their own sixteen-word poems with a Six Trait writing activity. They focus on word choice in this activity to capture an...
Curated OER
Compare Two Versions: Folk Tales, Sequencing, and Summary
Compare two versions of "The Three Little Pigs" (traditional and Jon Scieszka's The True Story of the Three Little Pigs, told from the wolf's point of view). As your 4th graders recount the familiar version of the story, emphasize the...
Curated OER
"User Friendly" Cause and Effect
Bring literature to life with your SMART board and this literary analysis instructional activity. While reading "User Friendly" by T. Ernesto Bethancourt (from the Holt Elements of Literature textbook by Kylene Beers), have your class...
Curated OER
Homer Price
An engaging and unique lesson that combines literature and economics is here for you. In it, learners read the short story, "The Doghnuts" found in the book Homer Price. Pupils define "capital resources," and utilize a worksheet...
Wake County Public Schools
Language
Have your class doing everything from reading literature, analyzing literary devices, identifying independent and dependent clauses, discussing, and writing creatively with the rich resource found here. After a mini activity on...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Edgar Allan Poe, Ambrose Bierce, and the Unreliable Narrator
Stories by Edgar Allan Poe and Ambrose Bierce provide readers with an opportunity to investigate unreliable narrators. The lesson plan begins with an activity about different types of point of view and continues as scholars apply their...
Curated OER
Giving with Imagination
Demonstrate gift giving as an act of caring about someone versus gifts for show (or gifts from the purse). Elementary learners practice giving gifts from the heart by creating a poem for someone special to them.
Curated OER
Mad-Libbing Your Way Into Modern Poetry
Use a Mad-Libs like activity to create modern poetry! Writers will identify different words and their parts of speech and study "The Red Wheelbarrow" by Williams Carlos Williams. Then, use the sheets attached to craft your own poem! An...
Curated OER
Maniac McGee
Students read and analyze the novel, Maniac McGee. They answer discussion questions, read the short story "Thank You, M'am," by Langston Hughes, and conduct Internet research on genealogical websites to analyze their first and last names.
EngageNY
Mid-Unit 2 Assessment: Analyzing Narrative Structure and Author’s Craft: Part 1
Using the resource, scholars complete a mid-unit assessment to gauge their learning at the halfway point of the unit. Pupils read the myth "The Harvest That Never Came" and plot its narrative structure.
Curated OER
Show Me the Story
Learners examine the elements of a story, read a review of Chris Rock's new sitcom, "Everybody Hates Chris" and create original sitcom episodes based on their own lives.
Curated OER
Perfecting My Pal's Poe Paragraph
After analyzing the compelling first paragraph of Edgar Allen Poe's short story "The Masque of the Red Death," high schoolers draft original opening paragraphs using techniques identified Poe's writing. The relationship between suspense...
Curated OER
Forming Plural Nouns
Everyone knows that a noun is a person, place, thing, or idea - but what happens when you have people, places, things, or ideas? Use this SMART board activity to guide your class through plural nouns. Several activities, including making...
EngageNY
Planning for Writing: Revisiting “Key Elements of Mythology” and Determining a Theme in the Myth of Cronus
Refresh my memory please. Scholars quickly read over the Myth of Cronus to refresh their memories of the story. They then get in groups and write parts of the myth on sticky notes that relate to the elements of mythology, sticking their...
Curated OER
Sequencing: Pictures Tell a Story
Students listen to a story and observe five illustrations of the main events drawn by the teacher. They arrange the illustrations in sequential order. Then, working in groups of five, they read stories and select five events, one for...