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Freedom for the Chilean Miners
Have your class read this seven paragraph article about Chilean miners who were trapped and freed from a mine. There are five comprehension questions, a verb-to-noun matching exercise, a role-play suggestion, and a creative writing task...
ESL Holiday Lessons
Christmas Day
Celebrary the holiday season fluently with a packet designed for English learners. The resource includes reading comprehension, spelling, scrambled sentences, and writing worksheets focused around Christmas.
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Writing to Photography/Photography to Writing
Students improve their' writing by incorporating photography into descriptive and narrative writing exercises. They write descriptions of various professional photographic collections. Later they use their own and other classmates'.
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Writing Up a Spanish Storm: Using Creative Thinking for Creative Writing
Students in a Spanish class are introduced to the techniques of creative writing. In groups, they focus on the pre-writing section of creative writing and keep a folder of their works throughout the lesson. They end the lessons by...
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Think of an Ending
Good endings are hard to find. And write. This, the final instructional activity in a six-part series devoted to study of the ingredients of a good story, focuses on crafting endings. Class members draft ideas about what should happen to...
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Develop a Paragraph
In this paragraph writing activity, students review the definition of a paragraph and then read the opening sentences for a paragraph on cooking. Students cut out the sentence strips and arrange the sentences in the order of topic...
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Context Clues, Plot Structure, Conflict, and Personal Narrative Essay
What are the elements of a personal narrative? Get your class talking by reading "The Necklace" and "A Dangerous Game." The lesson focuses primarily on defining certain vocabulary terms (like context clues, plot, conflict, climax, etc.)...
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Research Report
Students review research skills and discuss types of information, e.g. fact/opinion, examples/evidence then research and gather information to answer a given set of research questions. They write a multi paragraph report using the...
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Essay Writing
Students complete essay writing activities. In this essay writing lesson, students use an outline activity to learn about the advantages and disadvantages for various essay writing types. Students also break down the paragraphs into...
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Creative Writing
Fourth graders participate in an observation hike in this lesson. They orally share observations from their hike, and develop a paragraph in a shared writing exercise. Finally, the write their paragraph about process writing in their...
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Ex-Slave Narratives and WPA Interviews
Students analyze documents related to slave narratives and slave interviews. They complete a document analysis form to analyze the contnet and historiography of the documents. They write a paragraph detailing when and why the document...
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My Alphabetical Autobiography
Design a pictorial autobiography using the letters of the alphabet. For each letter, writers select visual images that represent life events and interests. Younger writers add words or sentences of explanation while older writers narrate...
K20 LEARN
The New Colossus: Determining Author's Perspective
Introduce young scholars to the concept of the author's perspective with a lesson that uses Emma Lazarus's poem, "The New Colossus," as the anchor text. Groups use a T-chart to identify words that reveal the author's point of view of The...
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Shakespeare: Henry V - Writing Task
Pairs of pupils choose a person who they consider to be a hero. They research that person, develop a speech, and deliver it to the class in hopes of persuading them that this person really is a hero. A vote is taken after the...
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Main Idea
What could you pack for a trip if you don't know the destination? After writing a list of items they would want to bring, fourth graders learn that the "trip" is to the South Pole - revealing the need to understand all available...
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Compound Words ESL 1 Beginners
Bring vocabulary to life with this SMARTboard activity! With a list of (linked) compound words, learners combine each part of the word to complete the compound word. They then read a narrative and identify the compound words. The last...
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Tall Tales and Urban Legends
For this creative writing worksheet, students sort through old pictures and discuss the characterization in each. Students create characters, a setting, and their own tall tale or urban legend based on the pictures.
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Point of You
Sixth graders study point of view by rewriting an existing narrative paragraph (using a different point-of-view). They expand this knowledge by writing an expository paragraph, then rewriting it to reflect a different point-of-view.
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Delicious Descriptive Adjectives
Students write out recipes with different adjectives then share them with the class.
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I spy (Camouflaged Animals in Art!)
Students create a picture of a camouflaged animal in its habitat. In this visual arts lesson, students look at Hans Hoffmann's painting A Hare in the Forest and discuss the animal's camouflage. They research their own animal to create a...
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Change Over Time
Learners write a personal narrative that is designed to help them reflect on the nature and meaning of change in their lives.
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School Day
Students participate in a lesson that involves writing a persuasive essay. They use the prompt of "extending the school day". The paper should contain correct elements of sentence structure with clear purpose that is supported with...
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Persuasive Letters and The Tell Tale Heart
Pupils write persuasive letters based on "The Tell Tale Heart." They brainstorm topic sentences, main ideas, and details. They analyze the character and determine if he is innocent or guilty. They create a map listing their reasons to...
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When A Story Met A Sandwich
How is a story like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich? Use making a sandwich as a metaphor to remind your writers that a good, solid beginning, a rich and rewarding middle, and an ending that brings everything together spices up a...