9 minute instructional video with examples and definitions of verbal irony, situational irony, and dramatic irony.

This lesson reviews the literary devices at work in John Updike's "Ace in the Hole." Students consider professional athletes who didn't pan out before taking an in-depth look at Updike's techniques.

This Random House for High School Teachers reader's guide includes an author interview and discussion questions designed to enhance student reading of Karen Thompson Walker's book, The Age of Miracles, the haunting and beautiful story of Julia and her family as they struggle to live in a time of extraordinary change.

This Random House for High School Teachers reader's guide includes an introduction, discussion questions, and author biography designed to enhance student reading of Cormac McCarthy's All the Pretty Horses, a novel that won both the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award in 1992.

Allegories are similar to metaphors: in both the author uses one subject to represent another, seemingly unrelated, subject. However, unlike metaphors, which are generally short and contained within a few lines, an allegory extends its representation over the course of an entire story, novel, or poem. This lesson plan will introduce students to the concept of allegory by using George Orwell’s widely read novella, Animal Farm, which is available on Project Gutenberg.

This Random House for High School Teachers reader's guide includes an introduction, discussion questions, suggested reading list, and author biography intended to enhance student discussion of Articles of War, Nick Arvin’s harrowing novel about one’s soldier’s confrontation with his own fear during World War II.

This Random House for High School Teachers reader's guide includes questions intended to enrich student discussion of Imbolo Mbue's novel, Behold the Dreamers-- a novel about marriage, immigration, class, race, and the trapdoors in the American Dream.

This Random House for High School Teachers reader's guide includes an introduction, discussion questions, author biography, and suggested reading list designed to enhance student reading of Cristina Henríquez’s The Book of Unknown Americans, a powerfully honest, unforgettable story of two families, brought together by love and tragedy, each struggling to find their place in a new country.

This lesson helps students understand the complexities of The Wife of Bath's character and the rhetoric of her argument by exploring the various ways in which Chaucer crafts a persona for her. After familiarizing themselves with the framing narrative of the Canterbury Tales and its language, students study the Wife of Bath as a character. Finally, students examine several primary source documents written about women and marraige in order to understand the context in which the Wife presents her argument.

In this Bright Hub Education downloadable workbook for A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, students will discover questions for each part of the novel, a tie in to one of the film adaptations, a writing assignment, and an objective test that can be turned in the day before the holiday break.

This lesson plan, intended to help students understand how to analyze a short story. Students use a note-taking chart to help break the story down as they read, then select quotations from the story that reflect their feelings as readers.

In this lesson, students gain background information to help them understand the context of A Modest Proposal as they read it. Also provided are activities to further student understanding after reading.

In this lesson, students gain an understanding of the oral language tradition of Anglo-Saxon poetry and identify how existing lines were affected by this tradition.

This teacher's guide for Counting Backwards by Laura Lascarso includes questions that cover key ideas and details as well as craft and structure, and postreading activities.

This Random House for High School Teachers reader's guide includes an introduction, discussion questions, and author biography designed to enhance student reading of Crow Lake, Mary Lawson's universal drama of love and misunderstanding recounts a family’s tragic and moving past.

Students will study poems about death, including A.E. Houseman's "To an Athlete Dying Young" and Dylan Thomas' "Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night." Students will be able to read, analyze and interpret the poems from both the thematic level of death and the detailed level of poetic form. This lesson also includes a guided analysis of a Shakespearean sonnet.

In this Penguin Reader's guide to Death of a Hero by Richard Aldington, students will learn the background of the book as well as the author, and deepen their understanding of the text through indepth discussion questions.

In this lesson, students take on the role of Victor Frankenstein and attempt to decide whether to create a mate for the horrible monster Victor created early in the novel. Students look at character goals, consider pros and cons of each decision, and write a persuasive essay explaining their decision.

In this Penguin Reader's guide to Herman Hesse's Demian, students will learn the background of the book as well as the author, and deepen their understanding of the text through indepth discussion questions.

This Random House for High School Teachers reader's guide includes an introduction, questions, and suggestions for further reading designed to enhance discussion of Edwidge Danticat's novel, The Dew Breaker, a powerful exploration of the way history, both personal and political, affects those who are swept up in its sometimes violent path.