Having students extract and create meaning out of words is a gift and task.  This gets them working with diction and figurative language then reflecting on the choices they made in their own written creations.

Students match the character traits of a character in a book they are reading with specific actions the character takes. Students then work in pairs to "become" one of the major characters in a book and describe themselves and other characters, using Internet reference tools to compile lists of accurate, powerful adjectives supported with details from the reading. The lesson uses The Scarlet Letter as an example, but this activity is effective with any work of literature in which characterization is important.

In this lesson students plan, write, illustrate, and publish their own children's picture books. First, students review illustrated children’s books to gain an understanding of the creative process and the elements that help make a children's book successful. Next, students use graphic organizers, peer feedback, and storyboards to brainstorm and create the relationship between the illustrations and text, as well as formalize character, setting, and conflict. Finally, students use a variety of methods to bind their books in an attractive manner and present their books to their peers.

In this lesson students view examples of applealing blogs, learn the basic elements of blog creation, and then create a blog from the perspective of a fictional character. Students demonstrate their understanding of the text by including images, quotations, links, and commentary on their blogs. Students then help one another develop their blogs by acting as editiors during the creation stage and reviewing one another's blogs upon completion.

As a way to support teachers with English Language Arts (ELA) instruction during the pandemic, the NCDPI ELA team created choice boards featuring standards-aligned ELA activities.The intended purpose of these choice boards is to provide a way for students to continue standards-based learning while schools are closed. Each activity can be adapted and modified to be completed with or without the use of digital tools. Many activities can also be repeated with different texts. These standards-based activities are meant to be a low-stress approach to reinforcing and enriching the skills learned during the 2019-2020 school year. The choice boards are to be used flexibly by teachers, parents, and students in order to meet the unique needs of each learner.Exploration activities are provided for a more self-directed or guided approach to independent learning for students. These activities and sites should be used as a way to explore concepts, topics, skills, and social and emotional competencies that interest the learner. 

In this lesson students explore ekphrasis, writing inspired through art. Through discussion poems inspired by works of art, students examine ways in which poets can approach a piece of artwork. Students then research piece of art that inspires them and in turn, compose a booklet of poems about the pieces they have chosen.

This resource provides a lesson that tasks high school students with assisting elementary level students to gain a deeper understanding of the expeditions of Lewis and Clark. The lesson is framed around the work, How We Crossed the West. As a culminating activity, the elementary students will produce a festival to prove what they have learned to the high school students.

This resource provides a lesson designed to help students understand the use of satire and the myriad technicques that authors may use to add it to their writing. Students use the film Shrek to examine the four techniques of exaggeration, incongruity, reversal and parody. Students prove their understanding by using satire to rewrite a fairly tale.

This resource includes a lesson plan designed to assist learners with the concepts of freedom, justice, discrimination and the American Dream. Students will examine the "I Have a Dream Speech" and select powerful words and themes from the text and arrange them into original diamante poems.

Students will read, critically analyze and write about a series of poems dealing with ghosts and spirits.

Students begin by evaluating the universal theme of betrayal from multiple perspectives. After reading time period scenarios as well as reflecting on personal experiences, students use critical thinking skills to explore and identify interventions for each betrayal scenario, including personal examples. Students then research Roman history as they write down thier own critical perspective of a scenario depicting plausible scenes from Roman times. As the culminating project and assessment, students will create comic strips with the Interactive Comic Creator

In this lesson, students will take a trip back in time and look at the lifestyles and classes of people in the late 1800s. Using a WedQuest, text, and graphic organizers, students will learn about the class systems in the 1800s and how the use of symbolism increased the point of interest within the story.

This lesson introduces students to the blues, one of the most distinctive and influential elements of African-American musical tradition. Students take a virtual tour of Memphis, TN and explore the history of the blues in the work of W.C. Handy and a variety of country blues singers whose music preserves the folk origins of this unique American art form. The lesson concludes with students composing their own blues lyrics.

Students will read, critically analyze and write about a series of poems dealing with light and darkness.

This activity utilizes the Shakespeare play Macbeth while connecting it to real-life situations and people. The historical figures involved can be changed, but these specific ones were chosen to provide diversity in location and time period with the goal to see that there are similarities in those who obtain power and abuse it while also recognizing the differences with each situation.  This helps to connect fiction to history and can help students understand the significnace of the themes that literature conveys to the audience.

This lesson pairs a magazine article about the Edmund Fitzgerald shipwreck in 1975 with the Gordon Lightfoot song, "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald." After comparing and contrasting the elements of each text, students will choose a historical event and, using the song as a model, create a narrative poem about their chosen event. In addition, more contemporary songs and current events will also work for this activity.

In this lesson, students refresh their understanding of the parts of speech before completing a fun activity to reinforce their knowledge. Students make wante posters of themselves using exciting adjectives to describe themselves.

In this video from American Masters | Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise, students will explore the role of poetry in American politics, compare Angelou and Frost, and consider how Angelou’s poem reflects the challenges and concerns of the time. Discussion questions, teaching tips, and a student handout push students to engage with Angelou’s words and to think critically about her famous work.

Students will watch and discuss video clips that show how two men in Chile coped with being prisoners in concentration camps during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. Each student will then create a non-fiction picture book that tells the story of one of these men and provides historical context.

In this performance task, students will work cooperatively to research the history of radio drama. Resources include original scripts from the 30's and 40's and an audio recording of Orson Wells' "War of the Worlds." Using what they've learned from their research, each group will create a script for a new mystery series. Students can extend the lesson by recording their drama complete with sound effects.