Students define elements of plot and identify plot elements in the fairy tale "Little Red Riding Hood."

This lesson explores how The Giver addresses issues of personal identity, memory, and the value of reading and education. It also examines how this newer read relates to other famous classics in this genre and books that students may have read on their own.

Change is an inevitable part of life that challenges many young adults. Understanding and accepting change are key components in career and future planning. In this lesson, students explore the theme of change through allegory and poetry by reading an example of literary allegory and creating their own pictorial allegories. Students first define allegory and complete a pictorial allegory or "me tree" that displays phrases describing their interests, trails, and dreams on outlines of their hands. Next, they read and discuss a text, such as Shel Silverstein’s, The Giving Tree or Sandy Stryker's Tonia the Tree that addresses change, and then review basic literary concepts as they complete a literary elements map and plot diagram. Finally, students further explore change, and what it means to them, as they write diamante poems related to the theme of change.

Katherine Paterson’s novel Bridge to Terabithia follows the relationship of fifth graders, Jess Aarons and Leslie Burke, as they meet and become friends. The book can be used as a means for students to understand and explore the value of friendship. In this lesson, which is most appropriate for use in fourth- through sixth-grade classrooms, students make predictions about the book and its main characters, complete character studies as part of an in-depth look at Jess and Leslie’s friendship, and relate the characters’ experiences to their own as they define friendship and identify ways to make and keep friends.

In this lesson, students are encouraged to explore the idea of memory in both large- and small-group settings. Students access their own life experiences and then discuss family stories they have heard. After choosing a family member to interview, students create questions, interview their relative, and write a personal narrative that describes not only the answers to their questions but their own reactions to these responses. These narratives are peer reviewed and can be published as a class magazine or a website.

In this lesson the students will be using a variety of skills to analyze fiction and expository texts. This combines the reading of detective fiction with written expository analysis in the form of a Detective’s Handbook. Each student reads a detective mystery, and the class watches and analyzes Murder She Purred to establish a collective example.

This page contains a set of general discussion questions for Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer.

This page contains a set of reading question for Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer.

Students work together in small groups to read, discuss, and analyze fairy tales. After compiling a list of common elements, students collaborate on their own original fairy tales—based on events from their own lives or the lives of someone they know. Each student decides what kind of experience to write about, composes and revises a fairy tale, and then presents their story to the rest of the class.

In this lesson, students will read and discuss two poems to explore the use of figurative language. Students will identify tone and examples of imagery and metaphor in poems. They will also explain how imagery and metaphor work together to create tone and create images to describe a scene.

This resource includes one poem, with an accompanying link to the poem being read aloud, and nine text-dependent questions (including one optional constructed-response prompt for students), and explanatory information for teachers regarding alignment to the CCSS.

In this lesson, students can explore for themselves the problem Tom Sawyer faced, how he “solved” his conundrum, and what he learned about human nature in the process. When combined with writing about the passage, students will learn to appreciate how Twain’s humor contains a deeper message and to derive satisfaction from struggling to master complex text.

In this CCSS lesson, students will explore this story through text dependent questions, academic vocabulary, and writing assignments.

In this lesson, students are introduced to and discuss the question about which they will be writing their essay: Should Lyddie sign the petition?

In this lesson, students gather and analyze textual evidence about why Lyddie should or should not sign the petition.

In this lesson, students reread the final passage listed on Lyddie’s Decision: Passages to Reread chart. Students then synthesize the evidence they have gathered to create reasons why Lyddie should and should not sign the petition.

In this lesson, students begin to read Lyddie, the central text of Unit 1.

In this lesson, students are introduced to several new routines to support them in their reading of Lyddie