Do monsters really exist? Find out what your class thinks with these discussion questions prior to reading Beowulf. Incorporate music and a video clip into the anticipatory set to engage your learners. Take a day to search online...

Students conduct a scientific investigation about organic or inorganic waste.  In this organic or inorganic waste lesson plan, students create a compost heap to determine the difference between inorganic and organic waste. Students...

Biotechnology pros produce their own biofuel using waste oil and fresh vegetable oil. They test the quality of their product using titration techniques and pH analysis. They write their observations and report their findings. Be aware...

Pair earth scientists up to use an amazing online arctic portal mapping tool and Google Earth to analyze permafrost changes. They compare changes to data on atmospheric concentrations of methane to see if there is a correlation. Then...

An online reading and interactive game bring the path of a carbon molecule to life for your earth science explorers! As an assessment, learners can map out or write about their experience in the carbon cycle. Thoroughly written...

After analyzing newspaper articles portraying different perspectives of the explosion of the Battleship USS Maine, your young historians will take a stand on which position is the most believable in both discussion and writing.

“What is the theme of this story?” Now there’s a question all pupils dread. Rather than encountering a sea of faces that look like they were painted by Edward Munch, face a classroom filled with smiles and confidence. Show your readers...

Draw back the curtain, add a spot of joy to your class, and let learners be lessoned by a close reading exercise that models how to develop an interpretation based on evidence drawn from a text. Robert Browning’s dramatic monologue “My...

“An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” Ambrose Bierce’s short story, is used to model how structural moves, the decisions an author makes about setting, point of view, time order, etc., can be examined to reveal an author’s purpose. Groups...

“There is nothing that becommeth a maid better than soberness, silence, shamefastness, and chastity, both of body & mind.” This line, from Thomas Bentley ‘s The Monument of Matrons published in 1582, typifies the way women were...

“Compared to war all other forms of human endeavor shrink to insignificance.” “War is not healthy for children and other living things.” These two views of war, embodied in George Patton’s statement and Lorraine Schneider‘s famous 1966...

How can you tell if something is living or nonliving? Introduce a set of criteria which can be used to determine which things are alive and which are not. The class discusses the basic needs of all living organisms, checks out an...

The threat posed by super volcanoes is explored in a short video that reviews the destruction caused by Mount Tambora in 1815 and by Peru's Huaynaputina in 1600. Think it can't happen again? The narrator contends that the explosive...

How can you tell what an owl has eaten? Study the food chain and flow of energy in an ecosystem by dissecting an owl pellet and noting the bones found inside. Additionally, the lesson includes a game about consumers and producers with a...

After challenging themselves to correctly choose the form of erosion and length of time required for a given landform to develop, earth science class members model mechanical and chemical weathering with various lab demonstrations over...

What can one learn about a planet based on a small surface sample? Learners will explore artifacts from a mystery planet and see what they can determine about the planet based on the evidence in front of them. 

As this short story unit comes to a close, provide a day for a full examination of theme and allow some time in class for individuals to work on their various assessments. This final lesson before presenting iMovies and portfolios is the...

Here is another in the fine series of art lessons from this excellent source. In this one, children create personal flags as expressions of their own life symbols and links between the student and the environment. The materials needed...

Students examine the serigraph, "Wynton's Tune," by artist Faith Ringgold. They discuss the painting, listen to jazz music, create a drawing that tells a story inspired by their favorite music, and write sentences describing their artwork.

Ninth graders conduct research on the subject of sea water. They use a variety of resources to obtain information. There are helpful resource links listed in the lesson. In conjunction with the research students make inquiry of the...

Lights, shadows, action, and inquiry await your artistic scientists. They explore the way light travels, absorbs, reflects, and transmits through shadow play. They create folktale-inspired shadow puppets, explore the science of light,...

Being self-aware of personal wants, needs, and values is a big part of growing up. Here, you'll find seven different teaching options and two different introductions to a instructional activity on getting learners to think about their...

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...

Whether your young biologists realize it or not, humans play a significant role in marine ecosystems. To help them understand this fact children first create graphical representations that show homo sapiens' place in marine...