Curated OER
The Odyssey Plan
Ninth graders read and analyze The Odyssey. They apply note-taking skills to identify enemy, type of enemy, and traits demonstrated throughout the book. Students create a storyboard that illustrates the selected episode from the book...
Curated OER
Shopping for Toys
Young scholars pretend as if they have just won a $100 gift certificate to buy some toys and must try to spend as much of it as they can without going over.
Curated OER
Searching for Me in You
High schoolers explore their own culture and identity through the study of literature and artwork of other cultures. Students read and discuss Last of the Breed and identify cultural values. They create a presentation that incorporates...
Curated OER
Reading Picnic
Students fill in the amount of minutes read nightly and any new words they come across. At the end of the month they have a "Reading Picnic." students bring their favorite book, snack, drink, and sheet.
Curated OER
Silent Spring
Students read background information about Rachel Carson found on the listed website links. They analyze and answer questions about her work and how it is linked to science then they research pesticide usage and alternative methods.
Curated OER
Infectious Diseases
Seventh graders create a brochure for a fictional pharmaceutical company.
Curated OER
An Arctic Expedition
Students become familiar with the Arctic region and the difficulties of scientific research by designing and developing an expedition to an "unknown" place. They use the library and the Internet in order to do their research. They...
Curated OER
Same, But Different
Young scholars compare and contrast specific characters in the book, "Old Henry." They discuss similarities and differences between people and define character traits. They assess one's own character traits and have a class discussion...
Curated OER
What Boat Designs Float the Best?
Fifth graders investigate buoyancy by conducting a science experiment. In this water properties lesson, 5th graders predict which of their different paper boat designs will float for the longest period. Students conduct the experiment...
Texas Education Agency
Texas Gateway: Effective Introduction and Conclusion Sentence Structure Variety
Write effective introductions and conclusions with a controlling idea or thesis, using a variety of sentence patterns.
Texas Education Agency
Texas Gateway: Effective Introduction, Conclusion, and Sentence Variety
[Accessible by TX Educators. Free Registration/Login Required] This lesson focuses on writing effective introductions and conclusions and tying them together. It also discusses varying sentence structures. Practice exercises are...
University of Ottawa (Canada)
University of Ottawa: Writing Paragraphs
This site from the University of Ottawa provides a wonderfully designed website that not only gives you exhaustive information on paragraph writing. Students will engage in starting with outlines, writing topic sentences, dividing their...
The Write Place
Literacy Education Online
Literacy Education Online (or LEO) is a great place to start if you need help with your writing. The homepage is organized around kinds of problems or questions you might have concerning your writing. Find your problem, click on the...
Cambridge Rindge & Latin School
Cambridge Rindge & Latin School: Research Paper: Writing a Conclusion
An excellent tip sheet on how to write and develop a conclusion to a research paper. Includes in-depth information and examples.
Writing Fix
Writing Fix: Show What Your Mind Sees
This writing activity asks writers to make use of both showing and telling as they create a well-organized paragraph of description. After reviewing showing versus telling by building a writer's notebook page, each writer will show what...
Texas Education Agency
Texas Gateway: Effective Intro & Conclusion & Variety of Sentence Structures
[Accessible by TX Educators. Free Registration/Login Required] This lesson focuses on the introduction which establishes the context for the information that will form the body of the essay, connecting the conclusion to the introduction,...
E Reading Worksheets
E Reading Worksheets: Writing Persuasive Essays
Persuasive writing is the topic of this article. Students will learn the parts of the persuasive essay and how to write an effective persuasive essay.
Joe Landsberger
Study Guides & Strategies: Writing Basics
This site by University of St. Thomas focuses on the basics for writing any paragraph. It is developed in outline fashion and is very easy to follow. This site provides a basic overview of the process of writing without going into a...
Sophia Learning
Sophia: Concluding Transition Words
This slideshow lesson focuses on the use of concluding transition words; it defines transition words and lists the categories. It explains when and how to use concluding transitions, provides a sample list of them, and offers sentence...
Joe Landsberger
Study Guides and Strategies: Expository Essays
This page has eight basic steps for writing expository essays: select topic, write the thesis, choose a method of development, organize, write topic sentences for body paragraph, write the body paragraphs, write an introduction, and...
University of Richmond
University of Richmond: Transitional Words and Phrases
This site has a list of transitional words and phrases organized by their function in a sentence or paragraph. Because they are organized under such headings as "providing an example" and "showing conclusions," it is easy to find an...
ArtsNow
Arts Now Learning: Self Portraits With the Touch of a Finger [Pdf]
In this lesson, students will explore self-portraiture by looking at classical portrait paintings, such as Diego Velazquez's La Infanta Margarita or Raphael's Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione. A close look at these works reveals...
Sophia Learning
Sophia: Concluding Transition Words
A screencast lesson [2 mins, 32 secs] introducing transition words used to conclude an idea and providing examples of how to use such transitions in concluding sentences. W.11-12.1c Transitions/Cohesion CCSS.ELA-Literacy.WHST.6-8.2.c