Students will watch and discuss video clips that show how two men in Chile coped with being prisoners in concentration camps during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. Each student will then create a non-fiction picture book that tells the story of one of these men and provides historical context.
Batter up! Studies show that using topics from popular culture in the classroom motivates students to read and write. This lesson, which can also be adapted for other topics, encourages students to look critically at trivia questions before writing their own. Students begin by listening to a read-aloud of Lou Gehrig: The Luckiest Man by David A. Adler and visiting websites containing baseball facts. Using the information they discover, students write questions to include in a Jeopardy game PowerPoint template. Playing the game with classmates enables students to share the facts they have discovered and creates a cooperative atmosphere in the classroom.
Behind many of the apparently simple stories of Robert Frost's poems are unexpected questions and mysteries. In this lesson, students analyze what speakers include or omit from their narrative accounts, make inferences about speakers' motivations, and find evidence for their inferences in the words of the poem.
This poetry lesson uses "Manatee/Humanity" to help students develop skills of noticing (seeing, hearing, and feeling) in relationship to poetry.
This lesson uses the postmodern picture book Black and White, by David Macaulay, to engage students in a deep analysis of writer's craft. Macaulay's book presents four separate story lines that playfully interact with one another throughout the text. Students explore ways in which authors use words and illustrations to create unexpected plots and connections within a text.
Power Notes is a strategy that teaches students an efficient form of organizing information from assigned text. This technique provides students a systematic way to look for relationships within material they are reading. Power Notes help visually display the differences between main ideas and supportive information in outline form. Main ideas or categories are assigned a power 1 rating. Details and examples are assigned power 2s, 3s, or 4s.
In this CCSS lesson, students will explore this speech through text dependent questions, academic vocabulary, and writing assignments.
Inclusion is an important concept in that it promotes equity and equality in the classroom. Students learn to work together despite their differences, capitalizing on their strengths and minimizing their deficits. Students within the school will be educated about the importance of inclusion, collaborating to complete activities and advocating for a school-wide inclusion program that involves all students, teachers and administrators.
“The Real Story of a Cowboy’s Life†describes a cattle drive from the perspective of real cowboys who rode on one. In this CCSS lesson, students will explore this history through text dependent questions, academic vocabulary, and writing assignments.
Literature circles are a way to engage students in reading by selecting texts to read and discuss with peers. Instead of traditional literature circle roles, use question stems as a way to spark discussion. These question stems build in the complexity of thinking required. Reflection questions are included for debriefing after the small group discussion.
This course was created by the Rethink Education Content Development Team. This course is aligned to the NC Standards for 7th Grade English Language Arts.
This course was created by the Rethink Education Content Development Team. This course is aligned to the NC Standards for 7th Grade ELA.
The main character, Esperanza, desperately wants to eat in the lunchroom at school, with the other boys and girls who do not go home for lunch break. In this CCSS lesson, students will explore this story through text dependent questions, academic vocabulary, and writing assignments.
A mongoose, Rikki-tikki-tavi, comes to live with an English family in their bungalow in colonial India. Two cobras—Nag and Nagaina—live in the garden surrounding the bungalow and threaten the lives of Rikki-tikki’s human family. Through a series of battles, Rikki-tikki-tavi kills Nag and Nagaina, protecting his human family and winning their trust and affection. 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 "Roll of Thunder, Hear my Cry" and participate in an Oprah Winfrey-style show to review the events in the novel and gain a more in-depth understanding of them.
In this lesson, students participate in a cooperative group activity to prepare to read the novel "Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry".
Within the life science strand of 7th grade science, students focus on the processes, structures, and functions of living organisms that enable them to survive, reproduce, and carry out the basic functions of life. In this lesson, students will work in groups to create an annotated diagram explaining how the major systems (except reproduction) are involved in the process of running. The real-world and collaborative aspects of this lesson allow students to build meaningful connections and promote the development of 21st Century Skills. This lesson was developed by NCDPI as part of the Academically and/or Intellectually Gifted Instructional Resources Project. This lesson plan has been vetted at the state level for standards alignment, AIG focus, and content accuracy.
Uses Sandburg's poem to introduce the TPCASTT analysis tool.
In this lesson, students explore the importance of detailed instruction and clear communication by working in pairs to draw what the other is viewing with only verbal communication.
In this lesson, students gather and record information with adults discovering their first, best, and worst school memories. Students transfer this information to a memory page containing the interview information, and present one part of their memory page.