Beacon Learning Center
Challenging the Human Spirit
High schoolers select a theme-related essay topic from Night, by Elie Wiesel, or The Metamorphosis, by Franz Kafka, and develop an essay that relates the theme to modern-day personal experiences. The essay follows a preset rubric...
Pennsylvania Department of Education
Tell Me Again
Students demonstrate how to retell a story in sequential order. In this reading comprehension instructional activity, students listen to a suggested read aloud, such as Little Boy Blue. Additionally, students practice retelling the story...
Curated OER
Job Prompt Entries
Students explore the role of journal writing. In this written communication lesson plan, students discuss the purpose of journals as well as cohesive devices. Students then respond to 2 writing prompts that require them to write using...
Curated OER
Animal Life Cycle
Students conduct hands-on experiments. In this life cycle instructional activity, students are able to observe a variety of animals as they travel through their life cycle (brine shrimp, mealworms, frog eggs and chicken eggs). Students...
Curated OER
Options and Extras!!! Learn All About It!
Eighth graders are asked what is the process of transitioning and why is it important? They listen as the counselor reviews the information from the pervious lesson. Students review peer sharing about what they have been taught and what...
Curated OER
Writing Stories With Comic Strips
In this writing worksheet, students fill in a comic strip style 3 row graphic organizer to write a short story. Each row shows a starting transition word and students are instructed to include speech bubbles to show what characters are...
Curated OER
The Editing Process
Students read a sample essay and evaluate them in groups. They write their own essay on a topic of their choice and use peer editing. They share their essays with the class.
Curated OER
Protest Music Video
Students use iMovie to express the meaning and context of a protest song from the '60s or '70s. They explore different views of the protest movement and gain an understanding of the emotional and political overtones of the times.
jc-schools
The Expository Essay
Did you ever create an awesome graphic organizer only to find that your class was completely baffled by how to use it? This resource not only provides you with a great graphic organizer for a standard five-paragraph essay, but also...
Beacon Learning Center
The Fun Polygon
Junior geometers use hands-on manipulatives to explore and describe the properties and attributes of a fundamental polygon, the triangle. They learn different kinds of angles and their measurements. This well-written lesson plan provides...
Curated OER
Dictating the Future
Read the article "Bush Lays Out Goals for Iraq: Self-Rule and Stability" and examine the keys points from President Bush's speech. Whether presented in written text or as an audio bite learners will work in groups to research world...
Curated OER
Analyzing Congruence Proofs
Looking at numerous examples of triangles, each with different properties, geometers develop their understanding of congruency. They use the notation of a counter-example to disprove certain conjectures and prove geometric theorems and...
Mr. Ambrose
The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald
Good discussion questions, quizzes, and tests teach as well as assess. Readers of The Great Gatsby will learn much from the materials in a 36-page packet designed to help students prepare for the AP Literature exam. Included in the...
Curated OER
The Great Migration
What a terrific instructional activity! Have your class learn about immigration using this resource. Fourth graders discuss the Great Migration in Ohio through art, writing, and discussion. Afterward, they create a presentation in which...
Curated OER
Everyone Can Benefit from Professional Development
These resources will point you in the direction of valuable professional development opportunities.
Curated OER
Describing Paintings: Calm or Stormy
Young writers use nouns, verbs, and adjectives to describe details in two paintings. One depicts a sunny landscape, and the other shows a cloudier view. They write a narrative inspired by the paintings, paying attention to transitional...
Curated OER
A Year
Young scholars examine an author's philosophical look at life through anecdotes he describes as a teacher in Uzbekistan. For this Uzbekistan lesson, students analyze a literary passage in order to identify, then practice using, similes,...
Curated OER
Regardless Of, No Matter, Regardless
For this grammar worksheet, students learn the proper use of three terms: regardless of, no matter, and regardless. After reading the rules, students rewrite 10 incorrect sentences with the right word choice.
Curated OER
The Final Copy
Write short stories in which events are presented in logical order, point of view is clear, theme and characters are developed. Middle schoolers also work on sensory language, concrete language and/or dialogue. They establish their...
Curated OER
The ABC's of the Three Little Pigs
Writers use varied sentence patterns. They listen to the story of Cinderella rewritten so that each sentence starts with the next letter of the alphabet. They create their own version of The Three Little Pigs using the same concept.
Curated OER
Propaganda
How does word choice affect the reading of a text? Compare two headlines that were written about the same event. Is one biased? Discuss how word choice often reveals the author's feelings about a topic. Then look at different techniques...
Curated OER
Lesson Ideas for Comparing and Contrasting Content
Here are three lesson ideas to help students learn how to compare and contrast information in any content area
Student Handouts
Foreign Affairs
Inform your class about foreign policy during the Reagan administration. The resource includes a reading passage that gives an overview of foreign policy decisions made during the Reagan administration and nine questions for pupils to...