Whether you are teaching a newspaper unit in language arts, covering the First Amendment and censorship in social studies, or focusing on writing ethics in journalism, a unit based on the foundations of journalism would be an excellent...

Robert Frost's "Nothing Gold Can Stay" serves as a model for a poetry analysis activity. The whole class critiques the sample and then groups select a poem and prepare a PowerPoint presentation in which they illustrate how their poet...

The 2010 immigration bill passed in Arizona provides class members with an opportunity to examine various perspectives of the immigration debate by watching news videos, reading interview, editorials, and viewing images. Discussion...

Writing poetry in ancient China was the modern equivalent of sending a greeting card. Scholars learn about the ancient Chinese poetic form called the lu shih. They read about the context of poetry during the T'ang Dynasty and complete a...

Which option would most children choose: One marshmallow now, or two marshmallows in 10 minutes? Learners watch the social experiment on video and discuss their observations. They then read articles and work in small groups to analyze...

Entrance essays are the ultimate sales pitch! Show your seniors how to market themselves in the first of six college and career readiness lesson plans. Pupils discover the do's and don'ts of writing personal statements through research,...

They say you gotta pay to play, and postsecondary education is no exception! High schoolers learn how to research and analyze the cost of postsecondary education as well as the different ways to pay for schooling. Learners then work...

Engage your pupils in a seres of journalism activities. For this journalism lesson plan, learners practice with AP style, analyze an article, practice writing leads, work with organizing information, and take a stab at writing headlines....

Try out a writing prompt that is great for a warm-up or an in-depth research project! Have kids describe an important invention and trace its development over the years. Use the writing prompt in a language arts class, social studies...

How do discerning readers determine bias and credibility? Ask small groups to figure it out! First, each group is provided with either articles or videos that contain bias. They examine the resources, respond to included questions, and...

Research was very different in the past. Pupils once had difficulty finding sufficient information, but now they have the opposite problem. Show your class how to pick the best resources out of the millions of sites an online search will...

Effective researchers use a variety of techniques to find what they need online. Pupils who complete the activities listed here should already have an arsenal of strategies for searching. They will learn about and practice two new...

Familiarize your class with Google operators, specific symbols, or words they can use to express more clearly to the search tool what they want to find. With the resources included here, they can test their previous knowledge, view...

The ability to analyze an argument is a skill emphasized by the Common Core standards. Offer your class an opportunity to develop and hone their skills by providing them the testimonies in an Oregon court case. After reading the facts of...

A super lesson plan that integrates technology and career exploration! High schoolers use graphic organizers and brainstorming to first analyze Time Magazine covers, then they think about what they want to be doing in 10 years. They...

The ninth in a fourteen-lesson series, this plan marks a sort of midpoint in a unit devoted to the study of short stories. Pupils learn about theme and work on their short story projects by adding to their blogs, checking in with the...

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...

Jamie Ford’s historical novel, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, explores the relationship between a young Chinese American boy and a Japanese American girl set against the backdrop of Seattle during World War II. The teaching...

Practice and fine-tune your learners' writing skills for Common Core standard W.11-12.2 with a plan that explains how to incorporate the McCarthy Hearings into their reading of The Crucible. It offers solid advice for students on how to...

For many emerging writers, essays are completed step-by-step. With the help of this instructional activity, learners will narrow down a topic, develop a thesis statement, develop a preliminary outline, conduct Internet research, and...

This slideshow lesson focuses on writing a reverse outline as a post writing strategy for assessing your paper for weak or missing aspects. It explains how to create the outline using a rubric if available and provides a skeletal example...

You will learn revision strategies you can use to strengthen your introduction and body of your paper. W.11-12.2a Intro/Format

Two PDF's that can be viewed online or downloaded and printed. The first is one page showing students several examples of abbreviations that can be used when taking notes. The second is a four pages and shows how different types of...

This Skillswise site focuses on nouns. Included are a video about why it is important to be able to identify nouns, fact sheets and worksheets for instruction, and quizzes on the information presented. The Skillswise sites from BBC are...