Working with magazine articles and other informational texts, students identify the parts of a non-fiction work. The learners use SMART board files to guide instruction, as well as a transition to writing their own non-fiction article in...

Use some of these 80-word passages to practice reading fluency with your beginners. Project the text so all learners can see it, pointing to each word as scholars recite them one at a time. Warn readers of irregularly spelled words by...

Individuals complete a pre-assessment to gauge their ability to determine the main idea and supporting details in nonfiction text. They examine a new piece of nonfiction reading by looking at the table of contents, headings, and index...

Examine the elements of nonfiction writings in this lesson. Learners list common features of nonfiction and compare nonfiction and fiction books on the same topic. Create a Venn diagram comparing and contrasting the two genres.

John Hughes' The Breakfast Club takes center stage in a lesson about annotating nonfiction texts to keep track of evidence that may be used later in discussions and writings. Scholars consider the stereotypes and conflicts presented in...

What kind of text features help children build a strong vocabulary? Class members use text features such as headers to unpack new vocabulary words. They create vocabulary journals in which they will write what they think the definition...

Ease into informational text with the lesson plan suggested here. Part of a unit series, the lesson plan draws from previous lessons and acts as a natural moment to add in informational text. Class members read one section of My...

Students are introduced to nonfiction text. In this five esson unti, students explore nonfiction as a genre. They identify the components and text structure of text structure of nonfiction text. Students read a nonfiction passage and...

Young readers work on evaluating claims in a piece of informational text with the article "In New York, It's Open Bag or Find Exits" from the New York Times. They analyze current search procedures implemented to fight terrorism...

Middle schoolers read and review informational texts, analyze cause and effect, and distinguish fact from opinion. They assess a "one-minute mystery" you read aloud for cause and effect relationships. Resource includes complete set of...

Students explore reading nonfiction. In this nonfiction instructional activity, students practice using KWL charts to organize nonfiction information gained from reading. Students explore unfamiliar words from reading and recognize...

Readers learn how to summarize scientific text and evaluate the advantages, disadvantages, and challenges in writing summaries. They select science-related articles you've pulled and collected from the New York Times and, with a partner,...

The sixth lesson plan in this Bullfrog at Magnolia Circle unit assesses your third graders' ability to read and understand informational text. The included assessment asks learners to take notes about the main idea and supporting...

As your class reaches the end of the book Bullfrog at Magnolia Circle, the seventh instructional activity in this literary unit helps third graders transition from reading narrative to expository writing. Scholars develop their...

Though the discrete content here is a pair of New York Times articles about a 1998 military strike on Iraq and the coincident impeachment by the House of Representatives of then-President Clinton, this detailed plan for creating,...

Learners discuss their personal connections with stories they've read in the past and identify techniques to connect with more stories. They create illustrations, construct task cards, and complete sentence stems based on books they read...

Get the scoop with a fun, engaging newspaper project. After analyzing the parts of a newspaper, including the headline, subtitles, and pictures or images, young journalists get to work by writing their own stories in a newspaper article...

Although not a complete lesson plan, this set of emotionally powerful texts could be used in a variety of lessons. From The New York Times' Learning Network site, the resource includes a poem, an excerpt from a New York Times article and...

Fifth graders compare and contrast an informational article with a fictional story. They read the story "The Contest" as a class, and discuss the different types of literature genres. Next, they complete a vocabulary worksheet and a...

Sixth graders recognize strategies for selecting nonfiction texts. In this book selection lesson, 6th graders practice procedures for knowing if the book is just right for them. Students select from a variety of texts and share their...

Are you teaching a high school language arts class and stumped for writing topics? Five pages of writing prompts for all kinds of writing should help you out. Many of these prompts refer to texts that are not included in this resource,...

Lights, camera, action. Scholars use page 33 of The Most Beautiful Roof in the World to create a readers theater. They work in triads and use sticky notes to mark and create their own speaking parts from sections of the text. They...

Reinforce comprehension of informational text. This is a one-on-one lesson intended to build an internal dialogue the reader can use to boost overall comprehension. They work independently with a tutor or teacher to read a nonfiction...

Expose your class to Waiting for the Biblioburro, narrative nonfiction that will act as the bridge between ficiton and informational texts to come. Class members do a close reading of the text, looking at excerpts instead of the whole...