Students analyze characterization by creating their own superheroes or super-villains,
complete with related gadgets and settings.
Fantastic Characters: Analyzing and Creating Superheroes and Villains
The Mysteries of Harris Burdick: Using Illustrations to Guide Writing
Students use illustrations from The Mysteries of Harris Burdick as a guide to write mysteries
and then present their stories to the class for students to discuss to which illustration each
story corresponds.
An Exploration of The Crucible through Seventeenth-Century Portraits
In this lesson, students incorporate analyses of characters from The Crucible with examinations of original seventeenth-century portraits of Puritans to create a visual portrait of the character. The project culminates in a "Portrait Gallery Walk" where students present and defend their artwork.
Audio Broadcasts and Podcasts: Oral Storytelling and Dramatization
After exploring Orson Welles' 1938 broadcast of H. G. Wells' War of the Worlds, students create their own audio dramatization of a text they have read.
Unlocking the Underlying Symbolism and Themes of a Dramatic Work
This lesson plan invites students to consider characters from Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun. Students explore a selected character and write poems about objects associated with that character.
Novel News: Broadcast Coverage of Character, Conflict, Resolution, and Setting
This twist on readers theater has students prepare original news programs based on incidents in a recent reading, as they explore standard literary elements of character, conflict, resolution, and setting.
Book Report Alternative: Characters for Hire! Studying Character in Drama
In this alternative to the traditional book report, students respond to a play they have read by creating a resume for one of its characters.
Blending the Past with Today's Technology: Using Prezi to Prepare for Historical Fiction
To prepare for literature circles featuring historical novels, students research the decades of the 1930s to the 1990s and share their information using Prezi, a web application for creating multimedia presentations.
From Text to Film: Exploring Classic Literature Adaptations
Students create storyboards to compare and contrast a book and its film adaptation.
What's the Purpose?: Examining a Cold Manipulation of Language
With a crafty pen, Truman Capote wrote In Cold Blood to create a new genre and shock his audience. This lesson will help students examine Capote's manipulation of language as he forces his audience to take a different look at murderers and consider a different definition of nonfiction. His unique purpose leaves students an interesting text to consider.
Audience & Purpose: Evaluating Disney's Changes to the Hercules Myth
What drives changes to classic myths and fables? In this lesson students evaluate the changes Disney made to the myth of "Hercules" in order to achieve their audience and purpose.
Get the Reel Scoop: Comparing Books to Movies
Students compare a book to its film adaptation, and then perform readers theater of a scene from the book that they feel was not well represented in the movie version.
Trading Card Creator
This tool provides a fun and useful way to explore a variety of topics such as a character in a book, a person or place from history, or even a physical object. An excellent tool to for summarizing or as a prewriting exercise for original stories.
Power of Picture Books, The: Using Content Area Literature in Middle School
Featuring descriptions and activities for fifty exceptional titles, Mary Jo Fresch and Peggy Harkins offer a wealth of ideas for harnessing the power of picture books to improve reading and writing in the content areas.
RAFT Writing Template
Students can utilize this printout to organize their writing as they learn to use the RAFT strategy. This printout enables students to clearly define their role, audience, format, and topic for writing.
Using the RAFT Writing Strategy
This strategy guide introduces the RAFT technique and offers practical ideas for using this technique to teach students to experiment with various perspectives in their writing.
Great Films and How to Teach Them
Costanzo offers high school and college teachers an updated, expanded edition that contains 80% new material on teaching film, including study guides of 14 new film with relevant ways to engage their students through a medium that students know and love.
The Ten-Minute Play: Encouraging Original Response to Challenging Texts
Students use both analytical and creative skills to adapt passages from a novel with significant internal dialogue and conflict, such as Toni Morrison's Beloved, into a ten-minute play.
Cover to Cover: Comparing Books to Movies
Students compare and analyze novels and the movies adapted from them. They design new DVD covers and a related insert for the movies, reflecting their response to the movie version.
The Peace Journey: Using Process Drama in the Classroom
What does peace mean to you? In this lesson, students attempt to answer this question as they write and perform a short skit that reflects their ideas of peace.