Whether you are planning a unit on F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, or simply want to improve your pupils' descriptive writing, this lesson could be a good addition to your class. Using the Six-Trait Writing process, pupils...

Use a Mad-Libs like activity to create modern poetry! Writers will identify different words and their parts of speech and study "The Red Wheelbarrow" by Williams Carlos Williams. Then, use the sheets attached to craft your own poem! An...

Animals oftentimes elicit various characteristics which make them symbolic or representative of human feeling, action, or emotion. The class creates horse characters out of clay to show character action and symbolism. This is a great...

Read the descriptive paragraph (included) with your middle schoolers, and have them study the stylistic elements included. They'll look for vivid verbs, alliteration, assonance, similes, and personification. Before writers craft their...

The class defines similes after creating a KWL chart about them. Groups rotate through a series of stations in which they creatively complete similes. They create a picture booklet that contains similes. However, the booklet topic and...

What does your class think about big business bailouts by the U.S. Government? Find out with this activity, where learners analyze a political cartoon comparing the "Big Three" automakers with the Greek Myth of Sisyphus. Background...

Use political cartoons to help your class understand the European Debt Crisis and visual symbolism. This analysis handout includes two cartoons depicting the crisis and prompts learners to consider possible symbols and allusions to best...

To practice comparing 2-digit numbers, learners evaluate 8 pairs of numbers and circle the appropriate symbol: greater than, less than, or equal to. Directions encourage use of "tens and ones." So break out the unit cubes and 10-rods to...

Begin reading The Crucible and form a foundation for your study with this presentation. Arthur Miller and the historical background of McCarthyism are covered at the beginning, followed by short descriptions of all the characters in...

Give your class some background information on both Nathaniel Hawthorne and his short story "Young Goodman Brown." Basic themes and characters are introduced, especially as this is an allegory with many symbolic elements. Help your...

Scholars examine codes, symbols, and other forms of communication. They discuss Morse Code. Next, they are given messages written in code, which they must decipher. 

Political cartoons are interesting and motivating, and they provide a great opportunity for critical informational analysis. This resource includes background information on the current credit crisis, a political cartoon, and three...

The name itself may have your scholars' heads spinning: Eyjafjallajökull. Its recent volcanic eruption spurred many political cartoons on unrelated topics- using an analysis handout scholars examine the use of metaphor in 2 cartoons...

Satire, sarcasm, or irony? Editorial cartoons have long been the tool artists use to express their opinions about politics and politicians. Kevin "Kai" Kallaugher's four-panel cartoon offers readers an opportunity to examine how he uses...

Use this political cartoon handout to help pupils understand the role the Blue Dog Coalition plays with regard to Health Care Reform. Football is used metaphorically to represent a player (Blue Dogs) tackling someone on his team (Obama)....

Challenge your class to reevaluate preconceived notions about government with this political cartoon analysis. An image presents a clear example of irony, in which a disgruntled American complains about his government, yet fails to see...

Tenth graders complete a variety of activities related to the first two chapters of the book The Outsiders. They define metaphor, simile, idiom, and hyperbole, and take a vocabulary pre-quiz. In small groups, they write a character...

Sixth graders explore figurative and literal language. They study literary devices through short pieces of Shakespeare's work. Then investigate Shakespeare's works and life.

Combining questions about figurative language and Sandra Cisneros's The House on Mango Street, this quiz would be a good addition to your class. The majority contains questions about simile, metaphor, and personification, from...

What do Jeep advertisements and Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath have in common? They both employ the art of the extended metaphor! Using the Six-Trait Writing model, learners begin to work on their own extended metaphors. Development...

Natalie Babbitt's award winning fantasy, Tuck Everlasting, is the anchor text in a unit plan that focuses on identifying similes, metaphors, imagery, and personification in the text and analyzing how these elements effect the...

Track instances of foreshadowing in any text with a straightforward graphic organizer. In one column, learners note down the events that happened, and in the other they list the clues that indicated that those events would happen. Some...

Ask your class to lend their ears, and eyes, to a short video that defines and offers examples of synecdoche and metonymy. Whether it be brand names like Kleenex® and Band-aids® that have come to stand for all the products in a category,...

Clichés, paradoxes, and equivocations are detailed in a short, animated video that defines and illustrates these writing traps. The resource also includes a quiz and the transcript for the video. Users can register to access free course...