In this lesson, students are introduced to the genre of American tall tales. Students are exposed to several traditional tall tales, then prompted to write an original tall tale set in contemporary America. The tall tale must address a current event or issue and must feature a "larger-than-life" main character. The students use exaggeration and hyperbole to portray the way in which the main character resolves the issue or problem. Students then dramatize their tall tales for the class.

This lesson provides a clear example of an author who created four specific voices. By reading and discussing the characters in Anthony Browne's picture book, Voices in the Park, students will gain a clear understanding of how to use voice in their own writing. Students begin by giving a readers? theater performance of the book and then discuss and analyze the voices heard. They then discuss the characters? personalities and find supporting evidence from the text and illustrations. Finally, students apply their knowledge by writing about a situation in a specific voice, making their character?s voice clear to the reader.

This unit is for 7th Grade. It also covers the following ELA standards:RL.7.3 Analyze how particular elements of a story or drama interact.RL.7.7 Compare and contrast a written story, drama, or poem to its audio, filmed, staged, or multimedia version, analyzing the effects of techniques unique to each medium 

Megan’s Great-grandmother Breckenridge has lived in three centuries. She was born in 1899 and now it is 2001. On the first day of 2001, Megan is annoyed that she and her mother are going to visit Great-grandmother Breckenridge in an Elder Care Facility. By the end of her visit, Megan’s feelings and opinions about Great-grandmother Breckenridge have changed from distaste and avoidance to eagerness to know her better. In this CCSS lesson, students will explore this story through text dependent questions, academic vocabulary, and writing assignments.

In this lesson, students study issues related to independence and notions of manliness in Ernest Hemingway’s “Three Shots” as they conduct in-depth literary character analysis, consider the significance of environment to growing up and investigate Hemingway’s Nobel Prize-winning, unique prose style. In addition, they will have the opportunity to write and revise a short story based on their own childhood experiences and together create a short story collection.

This horror story begins when three lighthouse keepers realize that a derelict ship heading for their tiny island is filled with thousands of giant rats. The ship runs aground and sinks; the famished rats scramble onto the island, and, in time, they break into the lighthouse. The besieged men struggle to stay alive. In this CCSS lesson, students will explore this story through text dependent questions, academic vocabulary, and writing assignments.

This resource includes one story and a short expository text, eleven text-dependent questions (including one optional constructed-response prompt for students), and explanatory information for teachers regarding alignment to the CCSS.

This teacher's guide for Totally Joe by James Howe contains discussion questions, activities, and research assignments.

This teacher's guide to Tracks by Diane Lee Wilson includes a summary of the text, discussion questions, activities, and research assignments.

This lesson allows students to see and experience how a story can drastically change when told from the perspective of a character whose voice was not heard in the story's original form. After reading and discussing a New York Times review of the latest Tarzan film, students will select a favorite children's story and rewrite it from another character's point of view, focusing on the character's view of the elements of the plot, other characters, and himself or herself.

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Worksheets and lessons for various levels to help students identify and/or reveal literary conflicts in selected passages.

Objective: Identify supportive evidence that supports their analysis of a text, including the theme, plot and character development.  Make inferences based drawn from the text and graphics.

Help students discover the Civil Rights Movement with We Who Believe in Freedom: The Life and Times of Ella Baker by Dr. Lea E. Williams. This complementary teacher's guide to the book delves into the transformative era through the lens of Ella Baker's remarkable journey, igniting discussions on activism, equality, and justice. Designed to engage Middle & High School students, the plan incorporates dynamic standards-aligned activities fostering critical thinking and historical understanding.

In this activity, students create a story map to identify the complex elements of plot after reading the novel The Cay.

This interactive lesson provides students with an opportunity to evaluate how the use of language and wordplay emphasie the theme presented in Shel Silverstein's humorous poem, "Sarah Cynthia Silvia Stout, Wouldn't Take the Garbage Out." Students will close read the poem and explain how the use of alliteration, hyperbole, and strong imagery assist in revealing the tone, characters, and theme.

In this lesson, students develop an understanding of setting in literature by first examining where their own life stories are currently set and then imagining what their ideal settings would be.

After an overview of the events surrounding Paul Revere's famous ride, this lesson challenges students to think about the reasons for that fame. Using both primary and secondhand accounts, students compare the account of Revere's ride in Longfellow's famous poem with actual historical events, in order to answer the question: why does Revere's ride occupy such a prominent place in the American consciousness?

This lesson invites students to reconfigure Meg’s journey into a board game where, as in the novel itself, Meg’s progress is either thwarted or advanced by aspects of her emotional responses to situations, her changing sense of self, and her physical and intellectual experiences.

In this lesson, students take on the role of the director of a movie. After exploring cinematic terms, students read a literary work with director's eyes. This lesson uses Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl as an example; however, the activities can be completed with any matched movie and piece of literature (e.g., any of the Harry Potter books, A Series of Unfortunate Events, or The Polar Express).