After reading the novel The Outsiders, students will be asked to write down the “dream life” that each of the main characters could be living, describing in detail the different things that would be in the different lives of three main characters. They will then design these ideal lives from their writing on three Merge Cubes using three cospaces designs. Students will then look at each other’s cubes and try to guess which character fits with each side of the cube and why while they document their thought process with each cube examination.

This resource accompanies our Rethink 7th 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 7th grade ELA content.

In this unit, students will be reading and writing myths following the structure of short stories and eventually publishing their own work.

The 7th grade poetry unit gives an in-depth approach to poetry. Included are worksheets, rubrics, and answers keys where applicable along with CCSS literature examples.

This resource contains activities to help students draw conclusions/make inferences. Such activities include: guess the emotion, you are what you bring, using pictures, and links to additional resources.

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

There is no one poem that represents the experience of African Americans in the United States, yet the history of racism in this country is seared deeply into the lives of many African Americans. “The Weakness” by Toi Derricotte recounts an experience with racism through the eyes of a young, light-skinned African American girl going shopping with her grandmother in a department store in 1945. The poems in The African American Experience offer a number of perspectives from African American poets that add a rich complexity to students’ perceptions of African American lives.

Seven-year old Annie Dillard enjoys playing football with the boys in her neighborhood because it requires her to play with concentration and courage. In this CCSS lesson, students will explore this story through text dependent questions, academic vocabulary, and writing assignments.

Seventeen-year-old best friends dream of becoming light-weight boxing champions of the world. They train together until they find out that they will meet in the ring to determine who will fight in a championship tournament. In this CCSS lesson, students will explore this story through text dependent questions, academic vocabulary, and writing assignments.

In this lesson, students will continue to analyze working conditions in the mill and how they affect Lyddie. This lesson adds a focus on word choice and figurative language, as students discuss how author Katherine Paterson’s choice of language helps the readers better understand Lyddie’s working conditions and how they affected her.

The purpose of this project is two-fold: first, to encourage students to make the reading of poetry a creative act; and, second, to help students appreciate particular literary devices in their functions as semaphores or interpretive signals. Those devices that are about the imagery of a poem (metaphor, simile, personification, description) can be thought of as magnifying glasses: we see most clearly that upon which the poet focuses our gaze. Similarly, those poetic devices that are about the sound of the poem (alliteration, consonance, enjambment, onomatopoeia, and repetition) can be thought of as volume buttons or amplifiers: we hear most clearly what the poet makes us listen to most attentively.

This is a poem about love that Poe has written in memory of his wife, whom he calls Annabel Lee. In this CCSS lesson, students will explore this story through text dependent questions, academic vocabulary, and writing assignments.

This resource is a collection of discussion questions to supplement The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein.

In this lesson, the students will read and reread the passage closely and focusing their reading through a series of questions and discussion about the text, students will be able to understand the structure and purpose of this particular soliloquy and how it delves into universal themes regarding the human condition.

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

What drives changes to classic myths and fables? In this lesson students evaluate the changes Disney made to the myth of "Hercules" in order to achieve their audience and purpose.

In The Bear Boy, a man does not teach his son the ways of Pueblo life and how to transition into manhood. In this CCSS lesson, students will explore this story through text dependent questions, academic vocabulary, and writing assignments.

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.

A teachers guide for Betsey Brown by Ntozake Shange, including chapter-specific questions for increased comprehension, questions for class discussion, and suggestions for further study.