Throughout time, innovators have taken basic ideas and changed them into creative and cutting-edge designs. Kids tackle the topic of innovations in relation to traditional or creative objects. They discuss traditional Navajo pottery then...

Here is the first of four poignant lessons on how humans and oceans interact, even if people live far from the coast. This particular activity also examines studies that are taking place in Antarctica of how climate change is affecting...

Do big bodies make big brains? Let your learners decide whether there is an association between body weight and brain weight by putting the data from different animals into a scatterplot. They can remove any outliers and then make a line...

Children gain first-hand experience with Native American agriculture while investigating the life cycle of plants with this engaging experiment. Focusing on what the natives called the Three Sisters - corn, beans, and squash - young...

Designing a travel brochure is a classic project that will help your class members develop a variety of skills, such as researching informational texts, designing creative visual products, and communicating what you have learned.

What was the Truman administration's position on foreign policy during the Cold War? Class members respond to an excerpt from President Harry S. Truman's "Truman Doctrine" with three questions in the space provided.

Determining whether or not something is living can be more difficult than it seems. Put your young scientists to work defining their own criteria to identify life, then work with three samples to see if they are alive or...

Following a site's community guidelines is just one step toward being an excellent digital citizen. After a brief introductory video, small groups come up with their own community guidelines and present their ideas to come up with a...

Who and what can you trust online? How do you know? After viewing a pair of introductory videos on positive and safe online conduct, learners discuss the content and put it into practice during an online search activity about alien...

Here is a fantastic primary source analysis activity regarding Frederick Douglass' speech delivered at the unveiling of the Freedmen's Monument in 1876. The follow-up discussion questions and activities highlight Douglass' discussion of...

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....

Studying Charlotte's Web in your class? Included here are worksheets and activities for pupils, and lessons for teachers. Learners examine the text, create their own little play using paper cutouts of the characters, complete a crossword...

What can teeth tell us about an animal's diet? Learners examine animal skulls to determine what their canines, incisros, premolars, and molars reveal. 

Transform your classroom into the African savannah, a mountain range, the forest, and an urban environment! Young scientists embark on an imaginary field study observing various cat species in native habitats and recording in field guides.

Explore six different habitats—wetlands, rainforest, savannah, desert, city, and cultivated land—to determine which habitat factors (food, water, shelter, and space) are high, medium, or low in each. Learners also use maps of Africa...

There are so many authors of short stories, and your class can have the chance to study quite a few. This seventh activity in a series of fourteen continues the decision-making process for the final assessment: a short story author...

How should pupils read short stories? Set them up for this unit with an introductory lesson that goes over the main characteristics of a short story and starts learners off reading their first short story of the unit. In order to get a...

What is a white elephant, and what does it have to do with Ernest Hemingway? Study "Hills Like White Elephants" in-depth by following the procedures outlined in this lesson, the fifth in a series of fourteen. Learners start the day with...

Young historians examine the work of Martin Luther King Jr. by reading and answering questions about the Montgomery Bus Boycott, the Albany Movement, the Birmingham and Chicago campaigns, and the Memphis Sanitation Worker's Strike....

Prepare to teach Jan Brett stories by taking a look at this teacher resource, which includes text-based questions, writing assignments, discussion ideas, and vocabulary practice for 18 different stories.

Teach your middle schoolers to use their ears to their highest potential! Pupils practice active listening skills and reflect on how careful listening might prove to be important in and out of the classroom.

How did free and enslaved blacks work to craft freedom for themselves and their families before the Civil War? Young historians read about the life of Thomas Day, a free black man who also owned slaves and had abolitionist ties in...

Despite the slightly off-putting title, the instructions and activities detailed in these project guidelines for researching a noteworthy figure will serve as a fantastic supplement to your next famous person research...

Readers are asked to identify the central idea and two supporting details that develop this main idea in an article about the apprentice system popular in colonial America.