In this lesson, students will analyze Orwell’s carefully chosen words, details, repetitions, and characterizations in these first few pages, students can construct a strong understanding of some of the key features of this society that will give them a solid framework for comprehending the rest of the novel.

This 8th grade unit highlights main events of the Civil Rights Movement and navigates to the life of Jackie Robinson and watching the movie 42.

This resource accompanies our Rethink 8th Grade ELA course. It includes ideas for use, ways to support exceptional children, ways to extend learning, digital resources and tools, tips for supporting English Language Learners and students with visual and hearing impairments. There are also ideas for offline learning. 

This parent guide supports parents in helping their child at home with the 8th grade ELA content.

In this activity, students will complete a close reading of the Gettysburg address by using the strategy called SOAPSTONE.

In this activity, students will examine examples of laws from Hammurabi's Code from the ancient Babylonian civilization. In small groups, they will determine what those laws tell them about the ancient civilization.

This lesson and resource helps students strengthen their persuasive writing by identifying and responding to counterarguments.

A nonfiction, Common Core aligned reading passage with textual analysis questions about main idea and textual support.

This lesson was designed to help students gain social studies/history content knowledge by using textual evidence to answer text-dependent questions.In this CCSS lesson, students will explore this history through text dependent questions, academic vocabulary, and writing assignments.

In this lesson, students will use compare/contrast and question/answer text structures to analyze how nonfiction text is structured, identify transitions that support text structures, and cite evidence to support the identification of text structures.

Students will: compare and contrast the city-states, Athens and Sparta, using a Venn diagram. compose an essay including the similarities and differences between the city-states, Athens and Sparta.

This resource is a collection of discussion questions and resoures to supplement Beacon Hills High, a story about an African American teenager's journey from Baltimore to Los Angeles and how she overcomes body-image, fame, cruel behavior and the other pressures of life.

Students use Shakespeare's Secret, a featured title on the Teachers' Choices Booklist (International Reading Association, 2006), as a springboard to exploration of the controversy regarding the authorship Shakespeare's works. The novel makes liberal use of the historical details surrounding William Shakespeare's life, and exposes students to the possibility raised by some theorists that Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford, was the true author of the works that have long been attributed to the Bard. Students explore the historical references in the novel and generate questions for further research. As they research these questions on suggested websites, they organize their findings with the help of the ReadWriteThink Notetaker. Then they work in small groups to create and present short dramatic skits that creatively connect the novel with the historical facts.

This resource is a nonfiction, Common Core aligned reading passage with textual analysis questions about main idea and textual support.

In this lesson, students will consider the strategies Ida B. Wells deployed to raise awareness of social problems and weigh the effectiveness of nonconformity to address a specific audience. Students will use Wells' story to write about a personal experience of conformity or non-conformity.

In this lesson, students will understand excerpts from an autobiographical work and retell scenes from the book. They will also collaborate to convert segments of the text into dialogue, creating a brief play about Susie King Taylor's involvement in the Civil War.

Students will determine the best way to govern by analyzing the writings of the Federalists and Anti-Federalists and apply their ideas during a Socratic Seminar.

In this lesson, students will analyze written documents for position of writer and content. They will then synthesize a historical position based upon document analysis and connect historical struggles for equality with current movements.

Birth of a Colony explores the history of North Carolina from the time of European exploration through the Tuscarora War. Presented in five acts, the video combines primary sources and expert commentary to bring this period of our history to life. The opening segment describes the forces that motivated European exploration and colonization of the New World. Explorers and colonists encountered native peoples with agricultural lifestyles, strong communities, and respect for the land. These Indian communities saw themselves as part of nature, and they lived in harmony with the natural world. Their spiritual practices, such as the Green Corn Ceremony, reflected this worldview. The Europeans came to the New World primarily in search of land and riches. With two such different cultural viewpoints, clashes were inevitable. This teacher's guide includes a strictly social studies lesson and a complementary ELA lesson (writing assignment).

Birth of a Colony explores the history of North Carolina from the time of European exploration through the Tuscarora War. Presented in five acts, the video combines primary sources and expert commentary to bring this period of our history to life. Act III of Birth of a Colony presents the story of England?s attempts to settle in the New World. Queen Elizabeth enlisted Sir Walter Raleigh to launch an expedition ?to inhabit and possess? any lands not already claimed by Spain or France. This was part of the global power struggle between Catholic Spain and Protestant England. Queen Elizabeth believed that if England could get a foothold in America, it would be possible to cut off the flow of gold, silver, and sugar that fueled Spain?s domination and threatened England?s security. This teacher's guide contains 2 SS lessons plans: The England of the Roanoke Colonies; The Art of John White. Additional suggested resources are also included. There are optional visual arts extension activities as well. The Birth of a Colony video can be accessed at the following link: http://video.unctv.org/video/2149619983/