Middle schoolers discover how to determine the flavor of a jellybean using different key documents.  In this economics lesson, students discuss Virginia economics and begin an activity in which they will help decide on the what...

Is your essay coherent? Does it make sense? Is it formatted correctly? Does it adhere to standard English conventions? This helpful and informative slide-show walks learners step by step through the editing and proofreading process. Each...

Assess your new learners' writing abilities and knowledge of literary terms with these diagnostic activities. Part of a back-to-school unit, this is meant to provide the teacher with information about the ability levels of their class....

Help your young writers use logic in their persuasive writing. Discuss the characteristics of a persuasive paper, and have pupils work together to explore and solve a syllogism. They will write a short persuasive paper which includes a...

After reading Elie Wiesel's Night, watching the movie Life is Beautiful, and researching World War II, class members write a comparison essay on the book and film. This includes a prior knowledge activity, discussion in whole and small...

Sixth graders experience the stages of process writing, work cooperatively, to critique and to incorporate software tools to enhance writing and problem solving skills.

Through grand conversation, help scholars identify issues that harm the Earth and find solutions on how to solve them. After voting—on what your class deems the most important problem—stretch writing muscles with a problem-solution...

Learners formulate a definition of art in the introductory lesson for a unit on various art forms. The learning emphasis is placed on Oregonian artist Duff Severe and reflective writing. Students compose an essay describing various art...

Are you teaching a high school language arts class and stumped for writing topics? Five pages of writing prompts for all kinds of writing should help you out. Many of these prompts refer to texts that are not included in this resource,...

Introduce your class to the personal essay with this worksheet. Learners identify the subject of an essay and then record examples from the essay that represent the author's thoughts and feelings regarding the subject. While this...

This lesson, which promises to improve the essays of your middle schoolers, contains a list of characteristics an essay should include. It breaks it down into the introduction, thesis statement, body, etc. There's also a list of things...

Prepare your class for applying to scholarships with this instructional activity. Although very bare-bones, this plan provides a writing prompt for learners that will surely get them thinking about how to present themselves to the...

Help your young writers through the sometimes difficult process of beginning to write. Direct them through how to choose a topic and write to a specific audience. Great refining statements guide them to writing focused, clear essays. 

Using the analogy of the human body, writing an essay is described in these slides. An overall look at writing, the analogy is meant to have writers consider how their paper functions as a whole. Details and instructions for writing are...

Review many different types of essays with this presentation. Each slide gives a short description of an essay such as narrative or persuasive. Makes for a good overview of various formats.

Focusing on writing an introduction, this presentation provides a variety of techniques for how to begin. Although the question marks on slide six obscure the writing, the other slides are clear and legible and display good examples for...

Introduce your class to various forms of writing. As the title states, this is a short PowerPoint, giving brief, but accurate descriptions of what each type of writing is used for. Pictorial representations are also helpful.

Of these five slides, two consist of the title and directions; the other three list the parts of an essay and their purpose, as well as how to best begin an essay. In essence, this is a very brief PowerPoint that can be used as a...

Use this presentation to introduce a class or lecture about writing organization. The slide show is the first part in a five-part series, titled "What is an Essay?" The slideshow is short and could use more detail, but functions as a...

Sixth graders make a hypothesis about the fall of the Roman Empire and then read data sets that show what really happened. In this Roman Empire lesson plan, 6th graders can revise their hypothesis as they read and then explain what...

In this literature learning exercise, students respond to 26 short answer and essay questions about Cervantes's Don Quixote. Students may also link to an online interactive quiz on the novel at the bottom of the page.

In this literature resource, students are presented with 8 short answer and essay questions about The Diary of Anne Frank. Students may also link to an online interactive quiz on the novel at the bottom of the page.

For this online interactive literature worksheet, learners respond to 9 short answer and essay questions about Anne Rand's Atlas Shrugged. Students may check some of their answers online.

In this online interactive literature worksheet, learners respond to 9 short answer and essay questions about Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Students may check some of their answers online.