Dander from the show Twisted Whiskers and characters from My Little Pony are featured in this three part lesson that explores using story pyramids to scaffold ideas, adding sensory details to enrich writing, and editing using common...

The history of the northern states' involvement in the slave trade is not widely known. This resource uses the PBS documentary, Traces of the Trade, and the nonfiction book, Children of the New England Slave Trade, to examine this aspect...

Show youngsters how objects can tell a story! Here your class will learn about Cuban salsa dancer Celia Cruz by analyzing pictures of her dress, her shoes, and her marriage certificate. After describing Cruz's items and imagining what...

Begin the school year with enthusiasm using the book entitled My Teacher Can Teach Anyone! In this reading for meaning lesson, primary readers listen to the story and discuss what is happening and why the boy in the story might be...

Is it possible to tell a true war story? Tim O’Brien says that fiction is for “getting at the truth when the truth isn’t sufficient for the truth.” To get at the truth about war, class members examine primary source materials from the...

Assess your new learners' writing abilities and knowledge of literary terms with these diagnostic activities. Part of a back-to-school unit, this is meant to provide the teacher with information about the ability levels of their class....

Quiz those kids to assess what they've gleaned from your last lesson on Newton's laws of motion. There are 10 questions that have learners define force, acceleration, velocity, and speed. A bonus question has them write a motion story...

What, there was a crocodile escape? Read, analyze, and examine a newspaper article with your class about the crocodiles that escaped in Vietnam. Your English language learners note the facts and key vocabulary in the story and answer...

Here is a good way for children to identify ways to handle conflict. They discuss the connection between feelings and conflict. Everyone listens to a story about a conflict between two friends and they discuss what they could have done...

Combine participial phrases and creative writing with this lesson, which is equally helpful for writing skills and conventions. After a mini-lesson on participial phrases and reading the picture book Dancing in the Wings, pupils use a...

Use this multidisciplinary lesson to delve into these subjects: English language arts, math, science, drama, and character education. After reading, discussing, and making interpretations about Go To Sleep, Gecko!: A Balinese...

Do your young readers have difficulty visualizing what they read? Although the activity described here is for The Call of the Wild, the strategy could be used with any narrative. At the conclusion of each chapter of Jack London’s novel,...

Just like a painting or the symbols on a flag, quilts can express ideas that reflect a cultural context, space, and time. The class discusses the history of quilt making throughout US history and what different types of quilts mean. They...

Ahoy there! A fun computer science lesson challenges pupils to write a program that creates an ocean wave. They then develop stories to accompany their projects. All of this takes place within the Scratch coding program.

Young academics create a current events journal by skimming newspapers for articles that fit defined guidelines for informational texts. After cutting out two articles each week to add to their journals, they write a brief description of...

In this engaging activity involving close analysis of abstract expressionist art, your class members will not only discover more about artist Friz Scholder's Native American art, but they will also have the opportunity to consider...

Focusing on the judicial branch of government, the fourth lesson in this series explores the structure of the US courts system. Beginning with an engaging activity based on the short story The Lady or the Tiger, students go on...

Do words change or add meaning or interest to a work of art? The final lesson in a four-part series on the beautiful brain as a work of art focuses on art analysis. Scholars write a story about exploring art from the inside. Reflections...

Students explore, as a basis for their poem, their own personal observations and understandings of a specific person's character which might include exploits, actions, mannerisms and personality. They write a brief poem that tells a story.

In this addition worksheet, 1st graders tell a story about five pigs using different colored counters. Students practice using counters to represent the various parts of an addition story.

Second graders identify the elements of the story "The Librarian from the Black Lagoon." They listen to the story and list the story elements of character, settling, problem, and solution. They then use KidPix to create individual...

Third graders practice retelling stories. They read a story and work with a partner to discuss the key elements: characters, setting, events, beginning, and end. They assess one another as they retell the story. They rewrite the story in...

In these story problems worksheets, students read the math problem story about 'The Secret of E. Quation the Great.' Students solve the question about the secret weights by using a letter to represent the unknown and circle the equation...