West Jefferson High School
The Novel — Honor
For classes tackling To Kill a Mockingbird, this lesson plan sets readers up for discussions or essay writing with questions and prompts. The prompts encourage individuals to explore beyond the novel itself, looking at photographs from...
Maryland Department of Education
Our Children Can Soar
Amazing efforts of African American leaders are celebrated in a lesson on civil participation. The engaging resource focuses on primary and secondary sources to analyze the impact of African American leaders such as Ella Fitzgerald....
Curated OER
Story Scrapbook
Students develop a comparison worksheet using one non fiction book and one fiction book they have read to be put into a class scrapbook. In their comparison students must have title, author, point of view, setting, characters, and other...
Curated OER
Quilting: The Story of the Underground Railroad
Students explore quilting. They read and discuss the book, Sweet Clara and the Freedom Quilt. They research African American quilting traditions on the Internet and name three common qualities in quilts. They create a quilt block...
Curated OER
Some Houses Are Made of Straw, Wood, or Brick: But... This House is Made of Mud...
First graders read and discuss several stories. They share information about different types of shelter around the world. They explain that lifestyles and shelter depend very much on where people live and how they use the resources...
Curated OER
Read a Transportation Story
Third graders research the building of a transcontinental road. In this railroad history lesson, 3rd graders discuss past and present transportation. Students look at historical photos and compare and contrast photos from today.
Curated OER
A Formal Analysis of Science Fiction
Students write a five paragraph expository theme. They explain in their theme how the story they read qualifies as science fiction. Students write using all the conventions of English correctly.
Curated OER
Picture This
Students explore finding facts from the Internet to create a nonfiction story. In this writing lesson, students fill out KWL charts and do internet research about the given topic of spiders. Students then create and illustrate their non...
Curated OER
The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty Lesson Plan 1
Students read the story "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty". As a class, they discuss what they daydream about and discuss why the character in the story does it. To end the lesson, they identify the characters, indirect and direct...
Curated OER
Creative Autobiography
Young scholars brainstorm and outline ideas for their autobiography. They begin composition of it as well. Students create a timeline of important events to help them get started and discuss the elements of a what makes a good story.
Curated OER
The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
Ninth graders read "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty." As they read the story, 9th graders list characters on a chart, define the characters as dynamic or static, make predictions of each character and justify their reasoning. Students...
Curated OER
Irony At Owl Creek
Students engage in study of literature in order to identify the use of irony in the context of reading two stories. They are compared and contrasted and the irony is exposed. The activities include the answering of several key questions.
Curated OER
An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge LP
Students engage in a reading of literature with the intention of working on the reading comprehension skill of identifying the plot of a story. They conduct independent reading looking for the plot and fill in the graphic organizer for...
Carnegie Library
Creative Writing: Middle School Lesson Plan
Enhance a unit on historical fiction with an engaging writing lesson. Learners bring the Industrial Era to life as they compose their own historical fiction pieces based on primary source images of Pittsburgh steel workers.
Penguin Books
A Teacher's Guide to William Shakespeare's Hamlet
Should Hamlet avenge his father's death? Is the ghost telling the truth or is it trying to trick Hamlet? Is Hamlet's inconsistent behavior a ploy or is he really insane? Something really is rotten in Denmark, and with the help of the...
Curated OER
Harriet The Spy
Fourth graders investigate the style of diary writing as its own genre of literature. They read Harriet The Spy in order to have a text for this literature study. Students use the skill of prediction to preview the story, and then...
Curated OER
The Gift of the Magi Lesson Plan
Ninth graders read "The Gift of the Magi". While reading the story, they share their predictions about what they believe might happen next and the author's purpose of writing the story. To end the lesson, they work together to analyze...
Curated OER
Storytelling
Students compose a story and tell it to the class. In this storytelling activity, students work in small groups to create an illustrated story. Students are given a checklist of elements to include in the assignment. Students then...
Curated OER
Persuasion
Students read various stories and write reflections in their journals. Using the text, they identify the techniques the characters used in persuading the reader or other characters in the story.They rewrite a fairy tale from the villains...
Curated OER
Open Your Eyes Wide-Shut
Students improve their language skills through 11 activities. In this language skills lesson, students listen to picture books, answer questions about elements of a story, enhance their vocabulary and grammar skills, use 5 W questions,...
Curated OER
Enrichment Activities - "Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH"
Fifth graders read the novel "Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH." They discuss the various characters in the book, and the different types of conflict that take place within the book. They also research owls and rats to make comparisons...
Curated OER
Using Comics to teach Habitat and the Balance of Nature
Students visit a specific online comics website to view a comic. They discuss the elements of the food chain that were seen in the story. They choose an inhabitant of the pond habitat that they have been reading about and do a research...
Curated OER
Wolves
Students utilize several different sources to research wolves, after completing the K-W-L process.
Walters Art Museum
The Symbolism of Allegorical Art
Introduce learners to allegorical art with four bronze sculptures by Francesco Bertos. After modeling how to recognize bias and allegory in Bertos' Africa, class groups examine the other three sculptures in the series before creating...