Using different writing/drawing materials (e.g., markers, color pencils, pastels, etc.), students learn how to communicate different moods and/or feelings to support their written ideas and how authors do the same through their work.
Color My World: Expanding Meaning Potential through Media
Analyzing Famous Speeches as Arguments
Students are often asked to perform speeches, but rarely do we require students to analyze speeches as carefully as we study works of literature. In this unit, students are required to identify the rhetorical strategies in a famous speech and the specific purpose for each chosen device. They will write an essay about its effectiveness and why it is still famous after all these years.
Entering History: Nikki Giovanni and Martin Luther King, Jr.
Nikki Giovanni's poem "The Funeral of Martin Luther King, Jr." is paired with Dr. King's "I Have a Dream" speech, taking students on a quest through time to the Civil Rights movement.
Campaigning for Fair Use: Public Service Announcements on Copyright Awareness
Students explore a range of resources on fair use and copyright then design their own audio public service announcements (PSAs), to be broadcast over the school's public address system.
Exploring Language and Identity: Amy Tan's "Mother Tongue" and Beyond
Students explore the idea of "different Englishes" by reading Amy Tan's "Mother Tongue" and writing literacy narratives about their own use of different language for different audiences and purposes.
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.
Vote for Me! Making Presidential Commercials Using Avatars
After researching political platforms of past presidents through primary sources and other resources, students create commercials for these presidents using Voki, an online web tool that produces speaking avatars.
What Did George Post Today? Learning About People of the American Revolution Through Facebook
After researching famous people of the American Revolution, students create Facebook-like PowerPoint presentations to share their knowledge with classmates.
Glogging About Natural Disasters
After researching various natural disasters, students share their findings with each other using glogs, or through poster presentations.
Book Report Alternative: Glog That Book!
In this alternative book report, students identify the elements of fiction in books they have read by creating glogs, interactive multimedia posters, and then share their glogs.
Responding to Tragedy: Then and Now
After reading several poets' personal responses to the September 11th terrorist attacks, students write a "then and now" poem that puts their early memories of the event in conversation with their current understanding of and response to the tragedy.
Professional Writing in Action! Publishing Student Reviews Online
Writing professional reviews teaches students to understand audience, content, and publication guidelines. In this lesson, students put these into practice as professional writers critiquing, designing, and publishing reviews on Amazon.com.
Authoring an Epilogue That Helps Our Characters Live On
This lesson uses One Green Apple by Eve Bunting to teach how characters change across a text. It will also guide students through writing an epilogue to accompany their independent book.
Literature Response in Primary Classrooms
This step-by-step literature response template for use with read-alouds asks students to use drawing and writing to respond to increasingly-complex prompts which address literary elements as well as personal connections.
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.
Active Reading through Self-Assessment: The Student-Made Quiz
This recurring lesson encourages students to comprehend their reading through inquiry and collaboration. They choose important quotations from the text and work in groups to formulate "quiz" questions that their peers will answer.
Sí, Se Puede: Making a Difference, One Letter at a Time
After reading the book ¡Si, Se Puede!/Yes, We Can!: Janitor Strike in L.A., students learn about labor unions, strikes, and organizing for change. Students interview staff members in their school to learn about their daily work life, and write persuasive advocacy letters.
Writing for Audience: The Revision Process in The Diary of Anne Frank
After reading or viewing The Diary of Anne Frank, students will make connections between audience and purpose and revise a journal entry with an outside audience in mind.
"Three Stones Back": Using Informational Text to Enhance Understanding of Ball Don't Lie
Students engage in a close reading of a passage from Matt de la Pena's novel Ball Don't Lie before researching important background information to assess the accuracy of the claims made by a character.
A Picture IS Worth a Thousand Words: Using Infographics to Illustrate How-to Writing
Students write step-by-step instructions on topics of their own choosing. Then using Piktochart, students create their own infographics to illustrate their instructions.