In this lesson, Ralph Fletcher's writing style is introduced to student writers. Students will write a rough draft about a time they ate, or a time when they saw someone else eat, something unusual. Then students will read and analyze...

After giving young scholars the writing topic "A Special Day that I Remember, give students ten to fifteen minutes to write on the topic. Then tell them they will be revising their "Special Day" prompt writing, but first they will listen...

After students are given time to think about the topic -"Alone Time with an Adult I Care about," they are given ten to fifteen minutes to write between five and ten sentences on the topic. They ten are told they will revise their...

This instructional activity, inspired by the novel Bronx Masquerade by Nikki Grimes is a fabulous classroom mentor text that helps teach a very powerful revision strategy: rewriting an idea in a completely different genre. Grimes' book...

Students learn about personification and how to use it to when writing about abstract nouns. Finally, students write poems using the nouns they have chosen and personifications they have developed. Teacher and student instructions are...

After reading excerpts in which Buck solves a problem in Jack London's The Call of the Wild, students write their own three-paragraph animal stories imitating London's style and word choice. Teacher and student instructions are provided...

Using the song "My Favorite Things" from the musical, The Sound of Music, as inspiration, learners will create their own song or poem (to the same tune) that lists their favorite things. Each verse will focus on their favorite things...

Using the song "Live Like You Were Dying" by Tim McGraw from the soundtrack for The Bucket List as a model, students will take a look at their values and the things they would like to accomplish in their lives before they run out of...

This is a great math writing assignment. First, students learn about the patterns and shapes of polynomial equations and their inverses by making their bodies imitate mathematical concepts, using popular disco & 80's dance moves....

Jack Johnson's "Inaudible Melodies" creates an interesting paradox of how society perceives itself versus the reality of how society really behaves. After listening to a second song using paradox in order to further understand the...

After reading several clothing descriptions and stories from the J. Peterman Clothing Catalogue, students imitate the voice of the catalogue to write descriptions and stories of their own clothes. Teacher instructions, printable graphic...

After listening to Van Morrison's "Days Like This" and Lee Ann Womack's "I Hope You Dance " and reading Dr. Seuss' Oh, the Places You'll Go! students will consider their choices in life. After asking students, "Who decides your lives are...

Inspired by Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs by Judi & Ron Barrett, students will brainstorm adjectives that center around food that might fall from the sky. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner foods will be brainstormed. They will then...

After reading Anne Whitford Paul's book Everything to Spend the Night from A-Z, young scholars write about a real or imaginary sleepover and what things they should take to make it a wonderful night.

This is a good first-time programming project. You'll learn how to use JavaScript to create a basic calculator program that you can run in your Web browser.

This is a challenging first-time programming project. You'll learn how to use JavaScript to create a simple program to analyze one or more paragraphs of text. Your program will count sentences, words and letters, and report the resulting...

This is a great writing lesson for math teachers. The picture book Take Me Out of the Bathtub by Alan Katz demonstrates his love of familiar songs and nursery rhymes by writing new lyrics that can be sung to them. For this assignment,...

This writing assignments asks students to assume the voice of a person from history they have researched. Focusing on a topic or belief the person showed passion about as history unfolded, the students write an essay modeled after NPR's...

By listening and then responding to multiple versions of the song "Summertime," students will understand how songs can convey various moods. Writing about a personal summertime memory, students will try to mimic a mood from one of the...

This is a writing activity perfect for a math class, it's designed to help students see the differences between linear (arithmetic, adding) and exponential (geometric, multiplying) growth. Students explore the ideas of linear and...

This writing assignments asks students to assume the voice of a character from a novel they are reading. Focusing on a topic or belief the character shows passion about in the novel, the students write an essay modeled after NPR's "This...

Using "Science Times" at NewYorkTimes.com, students will listen to podcasts to learn about and share science ideas that are currently in the news. By organizing and summarizing science thoughts, students will be able to effectively share...

For this lesson, young scholars will be exploring self image. They will be analyzing how they would like to ultimately be remembered by writing a eulogy, inspired by Sarah McLachlan's "I Will Remember You." They will then explore a...

After listening and analyzing song lyrics and, subsequently, doing the same analysis with poems, students will discover how similar song writing and poetry writing can be. Students will get their own chance to write a small version of...