The activities in this lesson invite students to focus on the characters from A Midsummer Night's Dream, to describe and analyze their conflicts, and then to watch how those conflicts get resolved.

In this lesson, a three-pronged approach is used to help students create mental images while reading. The first approach develops schemata (prior knowledge) and visual awareness (the understanding and interpretation of visual images) by introducing content-related picture books and having students respond to the illustrations using a series of question prompts. The next approach capitalizes on existing visual comprehension using a strategy called Watch-Read-Watch-Read (W-R-W-R), where video clips build background knowledge and assist students in developing "memory pegs" as they read. Finally, students use a strategy similar to the think-aloud approach, creating drawings to illustrate and understand relevant information gleaned from print.

This teacher's guide for The Misfits by James Howe containes discussion questions, activities, and research assignments.

The students will explore reading strategies using the think-aloud process as students investigate connections between the life and writings of Edgar Allan Poe. The unit, which begins with an in-depth exploration of “The Raven,” then moves students from a full-class reading of the poem to small-group readings of Poe’s short stories (“The Black Cat,” “Hop-Frog,” “Masque of the Red Death,” and “The Fall of the House of Usher”). The unit concludes with individual projects that explore the readings in more detail.

When a sudden and inexplicable force causes everything to stop working on Maple Street, the people there begin to wonder who or what is responsible. Fear begins to invade each person’s mind. This behavior reveals that the real monsters on Maple Street are the people themselves and the fears and prejudices they harbor. In this CCSS lesson, students will explore this story through text dependent questions, academic vocabulary, and writing assignments.

This lesson will be completed once students have read the script of the play The Monsters are Due on Maple Street and watched the film adaptation on The Twilight Zone. Students will complete a learning menu that includes an appetizer, entree, and dessert. All students will complete the same starter and main course but will then have a choice for their dessert.

Students will read a tsunami myth based in Japan. They will analyze the effect of the setting on character and plot details. Then, they will rewrite the myth to take place in an alternative location.

A teachers guide for My Sisters' Voices: Teenage Girls of Color Speak Out by Iris Jacob including questions for deeper comprehension, exercises for the class, and suggestions for further reading.

Using the topic of Mythology, students will work through various activities to learn the characteristics of a Narrative Essay. This particular unit will/should take place prior to writing the Narrative Essay. Many of the lessons address how to identify, create, apply and analyze point of view, theme, dialogue punctuation, argumenative qualities and citing direct and indirect evidence.

This resource includes six text-dependent questions, one constructed-response writing prompt, and explanatory information for teachers regarding alignment to the CCSS and a mini-assessment.

In this lesson, students make a list of the ways original stories have been revised—changed or altered, not just “corrected”—to begin building a definition of global revision after reading several fractured fairy tales. After students have written a “revised” story of their own, they revise again, focusing more on audience but still paying attention to ideas, organization, and voice. During another session, students look at editing as a way to polish writing, establishing a definition of revision as a multi-level process.

The main character, Mr. Johnson, embarks upon quite the opposite of an ordinary day. This day he spends as a do-gooder, wandering the streets of the city, purposefully taking time to insert himself into the lives of the people he passes. His perfect day is juxtaposed the moment he returns home to his grumpy, negative wife. The irony is: most ordinary days are not filled with all great deeds, but rather a mixture of positive and negative experiences. In this CCSS lesson, students will explore this story through text dependent questions, academic vocabulary, and writing assignments.

In this lesson, students read the novel "Freak the Mighty" and identify and explain the setting, character development, and plot elements in a graphic organizer.

In this lesson, after reading a short story, students will use the note taking strategy of outlining to reinforce an understanding of setting, character, plot, and theme.

Students will be able to read a grade level text,  the novel "The Outsiders". As they read they will have to cite information, make inferences and connections, summarize, compare different mediums (book and movie) and learn about the author and how her experiences shaped the novel. Students will also get to write persuasively and creatively during this unit.

Students will analyze the character's motives, actions, thoughts, feelings, quotes, goals, desires and other characters' opinions based evidence within the text.

Ursula K. Le Guin's A Wizard of Earthsea was a breakthrough novel when it was first published in 1968, pushing the boundaries of fantasy in literature. Explore how Earthsea paved the way for this beloved genre in this video from the American Masters film Worlds of Ursula K. Le Guin. Support materials help students examine elements of fantasy and discover why coming-of-age stories continue to draw readers to young adult fantasy fiction.

Students will practice visualizing and understanding that visualization is an important comprehension strategy. Students will share their visualization of the story through original artwork.

In this lesson, students learn about foreshadowing and how it contributes to plot development in a text.

This lesson is one part of a four lesson unit on Shakespeare Stealer. This theater and language arts lesson offers intellectual, creative and interpretive opportunities. Students will analyze and compare the puns and word play in selected scenes from the plays, The Shakespeare Stealer by Gary L. Blackwood and Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare. Students will then read scenes from each play in groups and interpret their meanings to prepare for a performance of the scene. The lesson culminates with students writing a short essay explaining how the playwrights used puns and word play to give their characters wit.