Foster critical thinking skills by using the DR-TA Strategy with Jonathan Swift’s “A Modest Proposal.” Class members read portions of the essay, stop and discuss what is happening, make predictions based on evidence from the text, and...

The video clip that comprises the warm up is not available, but the related article from The New York Times and the movie trailer for Aliens of the Deep are, leaving enough material to make this a fascinating lesson on deep-sea...

Foster reader confidence when encountering complex text and reinforce the skills readers have acquired to build and extend their understanding of text. The plan uses a section of Douglass’ narrative as an exemplar text. Directions for...

“The tempter or the tempted, who sins most?” Prediction, verification, judgment, and extensions of thought are all part of a Directed ReadingThinking Activity (DRTA) developed for Measure for Measure. The rationale, assessments...

Why do books end up on the banned book list? How do these banned books contribute to the literary canon? Start by showing the photo slide show, and discussing notably banned books. Then focus on some of the most popular objections:...

Challenge your sixth graders with this lesson about the freezing and boiling points of water. In these activities learners graph temperature data, read and analyze information, and identify the freezing and boiling points of water and...

What is true courage? Your class can explore the answer with these three Houghton-Mifflin stories ("Hatchet," "Passage to Freedom," "Climb or Die," and "The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle"), which feature courageous characters and...

Do people really need “a newer, bigger Holocaust” in order to change? Or is it possible that by making text-to-self connections to the stories of others people that they can change? In order to connect to Art Spiegelman’s Maus, class...

A reading of Theodore Roethke’s dark "Root Cellar" and Sylvia Plath’s more abstract "Mirror" launches a discussion of imagery and personification in poetry.  After finding examples of personification in the poems, class members...

Systematically diluting a full-strength sample of food coloring is meant to help earth scientists understand concentration in parts per million. While they will enjoy the lab exercise, it might be a challenge to help them relate it to...

Challenge your fifth graders with this lesson. They read about the American Revolution, discuss key terms, and engage in a variety of activities. First, they create a timeline, then they answer an online quiz, and finish by making a...

Understanding the concept of equality is fundamental to the success of young mathematicians. To explore this basic idea, children compare the dots arranged in pairs of rectangles in order to determine whether or not they contain an equal...

Finding engaging ways to help your middle schoolers build their vocabulary is not easy to do. The lesson presented here offers a great way to motivate them to build vocabulary by making it into a game. Teams of pupils use a dictionary...

There's nothing better than using a cooking lesson to teach about fractions! In this clever lesson, young chefs must determine the proper amounts of ingredients while using a standard measuring cup. The recipe is embedded in the plan,...

The wonderful world of Oobleck is entered in order to awaken your learner's sense of touch! As a warm up, learners put their hands in mystery bags in order to identify things that are wet, dry, hot, cold, hard, soft, rough, and smooth....

Knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis, evaluation. Class members use Bloom's taxonomy to craft six levels of discussion questions for Chris Crowe's novel, Mississippi Trial, 1955. Model questions from Chapter 3, a...

Incorporate writing into your physical education class. In groups, learners unscramble a list of words related to exercise and use them in their journal writings. Using their name, they write one word related to physical activity that...

As the culminating activity in a unit study of science fiction, young writers demonstrate their understanding of the genre by producing their own graphic novel. After deciding on the main elements of their story, individuals use a comic...