What would Ben do? Jumping off from the pseudonymous letters Ben Franklin fooled his older brother into publishing when he was still a teenager, young literary lovers dive into acting, writing, and addressing a local issue with wit and...

Start your unit on The Odyssey in a fun and accessible way! Three options help your young readers grasp the concept of brave Odysseus's tale, including making masks of Greek gods and goddesses, and responding to different...

Third, fourth, and fifth graders read the book The Bracelet by Yushiko Uchida and examine the events of Uchida's life. They participate in a guided discussion of Japanese culture, perform a reader's...

With graphic organizers galore, learners will follow the changes of church and state in early colonial America. They look at the differences between the pilgrims and the puritans in terms of beliefs and life ways. Myths and...

Why don't dinosaurs wander the earth any longer? Answer this fascinating question with young readers as they examine a brief informational text. There are bolded words to separate text sections which are an excellent example of...

With a couple of neat diagrams on student handouts, your life science or health class will examine the contents and serving sizes of healthy foods. They dissect a slice of pizza and scrutinize the nutritional value of its components in...

Get things cooking with the first lesson in this series on the science of food. Working in small groups, young scientists make and record observations about different mystery foods. These descriptions are then shared with the class and...

What better way to learn about plant life than by creating a class garden? Young botanists start with a brief discussion about radishes before planting seeds and watching them grow. To determine the importance of water,...

Meant to follow a lesson about how concentrated air particles can be inside of a building, this resource gets individuals to assess the possible air pollutants in their own homes. They take home a worksheet and circle spots on it that...

In order to learn that mold spores can be found in the air, observers grow bread mold and make observations for a few days. Afterward, they participate in a class discussion to arrive at the knowledge that bread spores are present in the...

First, estimate existing knowledge about air with a class discussion. Then, hand out a 10-question pre-assessment quiz to record how much pupils know to compare to their knowledge later. This will also give mini meteorologists the...

A good story is a great way to support skills that are necessary for encouraging strong reading skills. Here is a class I do, You do, We do style lesson that stars the tale, Ming Lo Moves the Mountain. Included are two fun pre-reading...

Engineering design projects serve as great opportunities for collaborative problem solving. In this case, students work in small groups designing, building, and eventually testing a structure that meets a teacher-specified objective. It...

After listening to a book about seeds, individuals locate, collect, and illustrate five seeds from the school garden and determine how the seed traveled to the plot.

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Scholars read Johnny Tremain to see how Johnny's terrible accident helped him become a part of history. Learners write two poems, analyze characters by matching descriptions, and create...

Jade from Renée Watson's Piecing Me Together wants to improve the world—and herself. Worksheets introduce new vocabulary, asks comprehension questions, and review personification and alliterations.

Little Man, in Vince Vawter's Paperboy, is a great baseball player, but due to stuttering he'd rather not speak to a soul. Scholars read how Little Man deals with his fears as they use vocabulary words to complete sentences,...

Have you ever felt trapped in your own body? That is likely how Melody in Sharon M. Draper's Out of My Mind feels. As scholars read to find out how Melody finally expresses herself, they complete sentences with new words, describe...

Scholars read about the unlucky events that continue to fall on the children in A Series of Unfortunate Events - The Bad Beginning by Lemony Snicket. A set of worksheet activities include completing sentences with vocabulary...

Enjoy solving riddles? Perhaps Sal, a character in Walk Two Moons, is the only one capable of understanding a mysterious message left on her doorstep. On a road trip with her grandparent, Sal tries to make sense of the bizarre world...

Robert Munsch's The Paperbag Princess and Jon Scieszkafrom's The True Story of the Three Little Pigs launch a discussion of the role of stereotypes in stories and movies.

Help prepare your youngsters for an emergency or natural disaster by discussing important topics as where to meet, how to remain in contact, and what belongs in an emergency kit. 

A silent discussion? Indeed. Readers engage in a silent conversation about Victor Martinez's award-winning novel by recording questions, insights, and comments on the board.

Using a carousel activity, class members gain an understanding of the idea of inferences by using pictures then connecting them to mathematics. Groups discuss their individual problems prior to sharing them with the entire class....