This resource accompanies our Rethink 6th 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 6th grade English Language Arts content.

This teacher's guide for Addie on the Inside by James Howe contains discussion questions, activities, and research assignments.

In this lesson, students are given the opportunity to be imaginative as they create illustrated postcards that depict one of the settings of their novel choices featuring journeys. Furthermore, they communicate about the importance of the settings as they write the text of their postcards.

In this lesson, students are introduced to familiar characters, from literature and from popular culture, whom readers first encounter as adults, but whose childhood stories are only told later. Students first discuss Merlin from the stories of King Arthur before reading Jane Yolen's Merlin and the Dragon. They then discuss the characteristics and stories of other familiar literary characters who are first introduced as adults. Then, in groups, students plan their own versions of a childhood for a selected character, and describe that childhood in the form of a short story, journal entry, or time capsule letter. This lesson uses Jane Yolen's Merlin and the Dragon to model the concept, as well as several examples from literature and popular culture. A suggested booklist is also provided.

Facebook-like pages used as book reports provide students a unique format to review several elements of fiction typically found in a traditional book report. Through the sharing of their Facebook-like pages in class, students will have suggestions for future reading.

This teacher's guide for The Boy on the Wooden Box by Leon Leyson with Marilyn J. Harran and Elisabeth B. Leyson contains discussion questions and activities for reading comprehension, learning about craft and structure, integrating information, and writing practice.

This language arts lesson offers a hands-on opportunity for students to understand characterization in literature and to connect historical and contemporary culture. Through research and study of Shakespearean England, student pairs get to know about the life of a character in the book Shakespeare Stealer. Students collect props and clues to create a “life box” and a poem about their character. Using props adds a visual and physical dimension to their learning while using words engages mental facilities, making this a whole brain activity. Students must communicate their clues and interpret others clues to reveal character’s identities.

Click the images on the form to watch the videos for each book.  Then, complete the form.After reading or watching the books, students will complete this form that focuses on theme, author's purpose and other skills.

Students investigate picture books organized in comparison/contrast structures to discover methods of organization (usually a combination of the point-by-point, whole-to-whole, or similarities-to-differences patterns) and the ways authors use transitions to guide readers. Students can then decide what organizational patterns and transitional words work best to accomplish their individual purposes in writing and apply those to their papers.

Includes six text-dependent questions, one constructed response writing prompt, and explanatory information for teachers regarding alignment to the CCSS.

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

This resource includes an excerpt from the book, "Two Hot Dogs with Everything", six text-dependent questions, one constructed-response writing prompt, and explanatory information for teachers regarding alignment to the CCSS.

"The Dog of Pompeii" centers on a blind boy, Tito, and his dog, Bimbo, his life-long devoted companion during A.D. 79 in the city of Pompeii. Bimbo is crucial to Tito’s survival because and during the course of the story, a volcano erupts and causes mass panic and death. In this CCSS lesson, students will explore this story through text dependent questions, academic vocabulary, and writing assignments.

While this lesson makes use of websites about Anne Frank and the Holocaust, teachers can easily adapt the activities to a variety of topics. Guided by the questions on the Observation and Inquiry Sheet provided, students work together to explore several online texts on the chosen topic. Then they examine one website in depth and consider how the unique features of the site are used to convey information about the topic. In a subsequent Silent Conversation, students initiate their own queries and discussions about the substantive content of the online texts. Students meet as a class to share their impressions and opinions of the various sites.

A guideline for teachers to compare the works of Edgar Allan Poe and Ambrose Bierce and discuss how their narration choices affect the piece and the reader.

In this assessment, students will write an on-demand essay analyzing the main character of The Lightning Thief using evidence from informational text "The Hero's Journey."

In this lesson, students are introduced to the genre of folktales and engage in a study of several Russian folktales. They are asked to read the tales aloud, and then to fill in a chart about each one. Next, they analyze the charts, answering questions about the folktales’ setting, main characters, and "uniquely Russian" attributes. They also compare and contrast Russian folktales with folktales they may have heard as young children. The lesson culminates with a writing assignment in which students will analyze the folktales or create their own.

Introducing the genre of Fantasy to students.  They will gain an understanding of the content and produce their own story for the product.  Modifications can be made on the length of the story the are to write.  There can also be a more in depth conversation on the genre by older groups.  

Science fiction has the potential to spark lively discussions while inviting students to extrapolate from their own working knowledge of scientific principles. They first define the science fiction genre and then read and discuss science fiction texts. Next, they conduct research to find science facts that support or dispute the science included in the plot of the science fiction book they read. Students then revisit their definition of the genre and revise based on their reading. Finally, students complete a project that examines the science fiction genre in relation to real-world science concepts and topics.