Students will enjoy this blast from the past as they read the works of Dr. Seuss and Shel Silverstein to analyze the way social issues are addressed in selected works.
Seuss and Silverstein: Posing Questions, Presenting Points
Using Word Webs to Teach Synonyms for Commonly Used Words
Students use word webs to choose synonyms for generic adjectives and to learn to adjust their word usage for different contexts.
Sort, Hunt, Write: A Weekly Spelling Program
It's easy to make spelling fun. Using a variety of activities from sorting to using words in context will help deepen students' understanding of word patterns.
Scaling Back to Essentials: Scaffolding Summarization With Fishbone Mapping
Students work in pairs and groups as they complete fishbone maps that highlight main ideas and relevant details from a cause-effect text and then write summaries of content area texts.
ABC Bookmaking Builds Vocabulary in the Content Areas
V is for vocabulary. A content area unit provides the theme for a specialized ABC book, as students select, research, define, and illustrate a word for each alphabet letter.
Using Songwriting to Build Awareness of Beginning Letter Sounds
"Bessie bird lives in a barn" in this lesson in which students create alliterative animal songs to help them learn letter names and consonant sounds and build phonemic awareness.
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.
Persuasive Essay: Environmental Issues
How can we convince others to agree with us on important issues? In this lesson, students explore relevant environmental issues and gather information to write persuasive essays.
Charting Characters for a More Complete Understanding of the Story
Character Perspective Charting allows students to compare multiple characters and their points of view to better understand a story.
I've Got the Literacy Blues
Students will be singing the blues in this lesson in which they identify themes from "The Gift of the Magi" and write and present blues poetry based on those themes.
A-Hunting We Will Go: Teaching Rhyming Through Musical Verse
Adapting the song "A-Hunting We Will Go," students put a whale in a pail and even "take a little bear and hug it if we dare."
Blending Fiction and Nonfiction to Improve Comprehension and Writing Skills
Students use a text set to increase understanding of content area material and demonstrate what they have learned by writing an original piece that blends together narrative and expository elements.
Behind the Scenes With Cinderella
Cinderella without castles, coaches, or ball gowns? Students use versions of Cinderella to explore how the setting of a storytime, place, and cultureaffects the characters and plot.
Exploring Disability Using Multimedia and the B-D-A Reading Strategy
History takes on new dimensions in this interactive multimedia lesson that emphasizes the B-D-A approach to research as students investigate the experiences of people with disabilities since the early 1800s.
Using the Four-Square Strategy to Define and Identify Poetic Terms
How do poets play with language? Students will explore some answers to this question as they search through poems for examples of alliteration, assonance, simile, and rhyme.
Figurative Language: Teaching Idioms
It's raining cats and dogs! Students explore figurative language through read-alouds, teacher modeling, and student-centered activities, further developing their understanding of the literal versus the metaphorical translations of idioms.
Flip-a-Chip: Examining Affixes and Roots to Build Vocabulary
Do your students detest having to define vocabulary words? Don"t confine them to worksheetsturn the study of affixes and roots into a hands-on contest to create context-rich vocabulary puzzles.
A Harlem Renaissance Retrospective: Connecting Art, Music, Dance, and Poetry
Students research, evaluate, and synthesize information about the Harlem Renaissance from varied resources, create an exhibit, and highlight connections across disciplines (i.e., art, music, and poetry) using a Venn diagram.
Discovering a Passion for Poetry With Langston Hughes
Through a study of Langston Hughes' poetry, students connect his writing to his place in history.
The Big Green Monster Teaches Phonics in Reading and Writing
A big green monster helps students build their reading fluency and word recognition skills through choral reading, literacy center activities, and writing stories.