Give a voice to even the most quiet learners! Post discussion questions in different locations (on the whiteboard or around the room on posters). Class members then either answer a question posed or comment on a peer's response. Instead...

Candide is a dense text. To assist in analyzing Voltaire's satire, groups employ a cubing strategy based on Bloom's taxonomy. Complete directions for the strategy, a template for the cube, a worksheet, and a topic list are included. 

You can eat a solar cell? A unit on solar energy begins with a discussion about organic solar cells, followed by directions on how to build your own. After following the teacher's directions to build an anthocyanin...

Some things are hard to resist. Small collaborative groups build circuits and calculate the voltage using Ohm's Law. Budding engineers explore the connection between the voltage across different resistors and linear...

“People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel." Black Tiger Academy’s martial arts instructional activity five of 20 has a great team building activity in which a...

Why is Birmingham known as the magic city? A comprehensive lesson plan provides hands-on activities, group discussion, and writing exercises to teach young historians about the importance of the city of Birmingham. Scholars learn the...

The benefits and drawbacks of convict leasing following the Civil War are the focus of a lesson that asks groups to examine primary source materials to gain an understanding of the program before individuals decide whether they...

Planes, trains, and automobiles. How many ways to travel are there? Scholars learn about modes of transportation in the past and how they have changed over time. Budding historians view a timeline, participate in group discussion, and...

The value in this Macbeth study guide is that it asks readers to not only chart events, but to also consider the significance of those events. The worksheets could be used as preparation for a full class discussion or the basis or a...

The chapter-by-chapter questions on a Catcher in the Rye study guide would serve well as a group work exercise in preparation for a whole class discussion of Salinger’s novel. The resource includes a nice mix of fact-based,...

The purpose of this first lesson in a series of five about enfranchisement and suffrage is to determine what class members already know, or think they know, about voting and voter registration. Groups...

“What’s in a name?” Just about everything. Barack Obama, Vincent van Gogh, Justin Bieber. Famous names evoke a multitude of reactions and poets often use the names of famous people in their works precisely because names carry...

What makes a poem difficult? Explore that topic and more with your class as you work through the instructional activity detailed here. Using materials from Poetry Out Loud, a national recitation contest, individuals or small groups...

Employ this resource to expand efficient ideas on how to present and organize activities that describe how researchers can implement their research by using direct quotes, paraphrasing, and summarizing—without plagiarizing. Activities...

Focus on similarities and differences with a jigsaw activity that requires pupils to compare Waiting for the Biblioburro to other texts they have read. To prepare, class members first respond to text-dependent questions, moving on to...

This lesson plan is hilarious! To understand how to investigate a topic, collect data, and evaluate the results, learners research the effects of laughter on health. Each group is assigned a research task, which they will turn into...

Geometric shapes make great visual models for introducing young mathematicians to the concept of fractions. Looking at a series of four circles, young scholars are asked to determine whether or not one half of each circle is shaded. To...

A real-world approach to common multiples asks learners to find different groups of flowers based on their multiples. Useable as a class activity or independent exercise, they will have to organize their thoughts to explain the totals of...

Here is an introduction to solving simultaneous linear equations. Start by drawing a line through two points. Create a second line which goes through the intersecting point. Background knowledge of how to find the equation of a line and...

Your class will be very interested in the results of this activity. How long does it take a MP3 and video game player to charge?  Sam only has an hour and the MP3 player only has 40% of its battery life left. Plus, his video player...

Many organizations put on barbecues in order to make money. In a real-world math problem, the money allotted to purchase steak and chicken at this barbecue is only one hundred dollars. It is up to your potential chefs to figure out how...

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...

Young mathematicians concentrate on learning to fluently count. Following the rules of the classic game Memory, children take turns flipping over cards in order to find pairs of numbers that cross a decade (e.g. 29 and 30). For younger...

Have a fun time teaching children to read analog clocks with this whole-group math activity. Using large sets of the numerals 1-12 and 0, 5, 10...55, the teacher creates a large clock on either the carpet or the white board, explaining...