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This lesson is part of a larger unit dealing with Early American Literature. In this lesson, students will become familiar with the figurative devices and strategies used by 17th Century Puritan poets when creating closed or fixed form poetry. 

This is a College- and Career-Ready Standards showcase lesson plan.

Grade(s)

9, 10, 11, 12

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Lesson Plan

To meet the content standard of “utiliz[ing] responsible and ethical research practices,” students must first identify what these practices are. In this activity, students will be assigned a style guide or set of standards to identify responsible and ethical research practices. They will add information from their assigned source to a class slideshow so that they may have a broad range of information on responsible and ethical research practices.

Grade(s)

9, 10

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Learning Activity

Foregrounding scientific vocabulary, these integrated lesson plans invite students to research worms in order to create a classroom habitat. Students are first introduced to inquiry notebooks and then use them to record what they already know about worms. Next, students observe the cover of a fiction book about worms and make a hypothesis on whether the book is fact or fiction, and then check their hypotheses after the book is read aloud. Next, after an introduction to related scientific words such as hypothesis, habitat, attribute, predator, and prey, students conduct and record research and findings in their inquiry notebooks. Once they have gathered the necessary information, students plan and build a worm habitat, which becomes the springboard for further scientific exploration, observation, and experimentation.

Grade(s)

K, 1, 2

Subject Area

English Language Arts
Science

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

The teacher will present an informational text from the website, ReadWorks. Students will interact with this non-fiction text by annotating the text digitally. The students will answer the questions associated with the article as an assessment. This learning activity will help explain the role of photosynthesis in cycling matter and energy into and out of organisms. The nonfiction text presents an experiment that will help explain the process of photosynthesis in an engaging, high-interest manner. 

Grade(s)

7

Subject Area

English Language Arts
Science

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

In addition to developing background knowledge about allusions and the etymology of keywords, students use an online tool to examine the relationship between the speaker and his father in Robert Hayden's "Those Winter Sundays". Then students explore how the poet uses consonance, assonance, and alliteration to illustrate this complex relationship. Finally, students use the idea of a composed memory and their knowledge of sonic patterns to draft, revise, and share their own original text. 

The updated link for the BioCube resource is https://www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources/student-interactives/cube

Grade(s)

9, 10, 11, 12

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

This reading comprehension activity from MrNussbaum.com contains a historical passage about Hank Aaron.  Students can read this passage as an introductory lesson or as an assessment using the questions included.  Students receive immediate feedback on multiple-choice questions. Students may click on "listen" to have the passage read to them. 

Grade(s)

4, 6

Subject Area

English Language Arts
Social Studies

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

Verbs have a singular and a plural form. When using a verb in a sentence, pay attention to the subject-verb agreement. This means, that the subject and the verb must agree in number. In this lesson, students will learn about subject-verb agreement. This resource offers videos, games, and worksheets to help further understand the concept taught in this lesson.

Grade(s)

3, 4, 5

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

In this activity, the student will determine how rhetorical style contributes to the meaning of fiction. The student will follow along with the teacher as he/she presents notes on rhetorical style and meaning in fiction to complete a note sheet. This activity will help the students define, identify, and interpret two types of rhetorical styles which contribute to the meaning of fiction.

This activity results from the ALEX Resource Development Summit.

Grade(s)

11

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Learning Activity

Save the Earth from all kinds of waste and trash. Rap with Mister C, read charts with a landfill rat, break the code for recycling symbols, then share this dirty, rotten, self-paced lesson with your friends.

This resource guides students as they identify the main idea and support details of a text.

Grade(s)

3, 4, 5

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

This lesson teaches personification as a form of figurative language. Students will be introduced to characters and objects in stories, poems, and a movie clip that possess human characteristics. This topic can be used as a stand-alone lesson or with a unit on figurative language.

Grade(s)

3

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Lesson Plan

This video resource will provide fourth- and fifth-grade students with a strategy to determine the meaning of unfamiliar words using context clues. This video demonstrates using the "IDEAS Method" (Inference, Definition, Example, Antonym, and Synonym) to learn new words. By looking at words around a new word, the lesson activity helps students to understand new vocabulary.

Grade(s)

4, 5

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

Movies can be an integral part of the language arts classroom when they are used in ways that encourage and develop students' critical thinking. In this activity, students explore matching texts—novels and the movies adapted from them—to develop their analytical strategies. They use graphic organizers to draw comparisons between the two texts and hypothesize about the effect of adaptation. They analyze the differences between the two versions by citing specific adaptations in the film version, indicating the effect of each adaptation on the story, and deciding if they felt the change had a positive effect on the overall story. Students then design new DVD covers and a related insert for the movies, reflecting their response to the movie version.

Grade(s)

6, 7, 8

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

Students will identify and draw landscape elements for the foreground, middle ground, and background.  They will use a stylus to make a scratchboard landscape drawing.  They will compose a story about a journey through their landscape.  Assessment rubric, letter to parents, examples of artwork, and lesson plan included in PDF.  

Grade(s)

4

Subject Area

English Language Arts
Arts Education

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

The teacher will introduce students to the word syllable and demonstrate to students how to count syllables in words using the digital tool. Next, the teacher will read a haiku poem to students and have the students count the syllables in the haiku using the strategy demonstrated in the video clip. Lastly, the teacher and students will read a variety of haiku poems, with the teacher encouraging the students to identify the syllable pattern in each poem using non-locomotor movements. The students will use mental math to calculate the number of syllables present in each line of a haiku poem and describe how this pattern supplies rhythm in a haiku. 

This activity was created as a result of the Arts COS Resource Development Summit.

Grade(s)

2

Subject Area

English Language Arts
Mathematics
Arts Education

Learning Resource Type

Learning Activity

In this learning activity, students will read Dear Basketball by Kobe Bryant. Students will then complete a Poetry Analysis graphic organizer looking for the following literary devices in the poem: metaphor, alliteration, rhyme, hyperbole, repetition, imagery, and personification. Finally, students will explain how using the specific literary device enhances the meaning of the poem. 

This activity was created as a result of the ALEX Resource Development Summit.

Grade(s)

7

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Learning Activity

Become a detective and solve "The Case of the Missing Theme"!

 

When Carmen is given a class assignment to find a story's theme, she is stumped! Detective J. answers her call for help by showing her the difference between a theme and a topic. Carmen learns from Detective J. to find a theme by acting out the story's clues!

 

This resource teaches students how to identify the theme of a story. The resource uses a fable to model how to identify themes. 

Grade(s)

2

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

This lesson looks at the natural resources that drew businesses to Alabama. Students will explore the adapted 1820 letter from Mason and Dexter in Cahaba, Alabama to Richards and Simmons in Cumberland, Rhode Island.  Students will explain ideas within this historical text based on specific information presented in this primary source.

This lesson can be used as a stand-alone or can follow A Natural Attraction: The Natural Resources of Alabama During the Early Nineteenth Century

This lesson was created in partnership with the Alabama Department of Archives and History.

Grade(s)

4

Subject Area

English Language Arts
Social Studies

Learning Resource Type

Lesson Plan

In this free resource from ReadWriteThink, students work together to craft a list of common fairy tale elements in order to determine what makes a fairy tale a fairy tale. They then explore and analyze a variety of tales, recording their information using a story map. The story map becomes a launching point for students' own fairy tales. Students use the characteristics of a known tale and change one of the literary elements to create a new tale, which includes a different set of characters, has a new setting, or includes a changed conflict or resolution. Finally, students publish and illustrate their new “fractured fairy tales” for others to enjoy.

Grade(s)

3, 4, 5

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

Students will review orchestra, instruments, and instrument families. They will identify instruments by sight and sound. They will discuss how the instruments in each family are "related." They will write a descriptive paragraph about each family.  

Grade(s)

2, 3, 4, 5

Subject Area

English Language Arts
Arts Education

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

Students will create a 16-count dance that communicates and describes a character in a story. Students will base their dance on a character's traits. 

This activity was created as a result of the Arts COS Resource Development Summit.

Grade(s)

3

Subject Area

Arts Education
English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Learning Activity

This activity serves to introduce or refresh students about the steps in the writing process before writing an essay. This is a pre-test to see what the students know before writing an essay. It gives the definitions of the seven steps and can be used to study throughout the course of the year.

This resource was created in partnership with Dothan City Schools.

Grade(s)

6

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Learning Activity

Verb tense is used to show when an action occurs, whether it is in the past, the present, or the future. This is a short, fun video with an activity sheet students can use to practice identifying the correct verb tense.

Grade(s)

3, 4, 5

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

Students will begin by brainstorming a list of needs that must be met for an animal to survive in its habitat. Next, the students will observe an ant farm, created by the teacher prior to the lesson, and determine how the ants' needs are being met through their environment. Then, students will create a list of needs that must be met for a plant to survive in its habitat and compare this list to animals' survival needs. Lastly, the teacher will assist students in developing a plan to build a natural habitat conducive to meeting the needs of a plant. At the conclusion of the lesson, the students will construct a plant terrarium. 

This lesson was created as part of the 2016 NASA STEM Standards of Practice Project, a collaboration between the Alabama State Department of Education and NASA Marshall Space Flight Center.

Grade(s)

K

Subject Area

English Language Arts
Science

Learning Resource Type

Lesson Plan

Collaborative groups will read a variety of American tall tales, then report elements of their story to the whole class. Students add story information to a collaborative, whole-class character study matrix that summarizes all the stories. In a writing activity, students compare two characters of their choice. Support for English Language Learners (ELLs) is embedded in the guided collaborative process, while the content of the stories adds to all students' knowledge of American culture and history. The stories used in the lesson include well known and lesser-known diverse characters. The lesson process is applicable to any set of related texts.

Grade(s)

2, 3, 4, 5, 6

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

Engineering is the “silent E” in STEM subject areas. While science, mathematics, and technology are often topics of content area lessons, engineering is often ignored. However, engineering is inclusive of all STEM subjects because engineers use science, mathematics, and technology to solve problems. Engineering careers are diverse, spanning many different technologies and disciplines, such as agricultural engineering, aerospace engineering, computer engineering, mechanical engineering, and chemical engineering. Each of these jobs involves a rich, highly-specialized vocabulary. In this lesson, students are introduced to the vocabulary of engineering careers by reading informational websites. After learning the terminology, they use discipline-specific vocabulary words to create poems about engineering careers.

Grade(s)

7

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

In this activity, the teacher will introduce the Answer, Cite, Explain (A.C.E.) strategy to help students answer questions that require text evidence. The students will practice answering text evidence questions using a text of the teacher's choice.

This activity results from the ALEX Resource Gap Project.

Grade(s)

6

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Learning Activity

In this activity, the teacher will use the Google Doc to introduce students to "Chunking Multisyllabic Words.The teacher will model how to chunk syllable parts and read multisyllabic words using the first two words simple and even. The teacher will have students join her to chunk and read the rest of the words. This activity is meant to be multisensory, allowing students to stand up and use their hands to chunk words (like an alligator snapping for food). 

This resource was created in partnership with Dothan City Schools.

Grade(s)

3

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Learning Activity

This lesson will focus on creating timelines. Students will use important dates from their lives to create a personal 5 event timeline. Students will use rulers to measure equal spaces for their timelines. This lesson will require two one-hour sessions. The first lesson will include the lesson introduction, work on timelines, and time for formative assessments as students work. The second session will be used to complete timelines, share projects, and complete exit tickets.

This unit was created as part of the ALEX Interdisciplinary Resource Development Summit.

Grade(s)

2

Subject Area

English Language Arts
Mathematics
Social Studies

Learning Resource Type

Lesson Plan

Mysteries are a great way to hook students into writing about fictional happenings. In this lesson, students engage themselves in The Mysteries of Harris Burdick by examining the illustrations in the book and choosing one for which to create a Mystery Cube and then a creative writing piece. Finally, students present their mysteries to the class and allow students to guess to which illustration their mystery corresponds.

Grade(s)

5, 6, 7, 8, 9

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

In this video, students learn how and when to use cohesive devices like determiners, pronouns, conjunctions, and adverbs. This video is perfect to help with grammar homework.

Grade(s)

3

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

This activity will introduce the study of Alabama's Civil Rights movement. The students will analyze a photograph of the church interior after the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing. The juxtaposition of the blown-out window and debris-littered pew will encourage students to observe, infer, and make predictions.  

This activity results from the ALEX Resource Gap Project.

Grade(s)

6

Subject Area

English Language Arts
Social Studies

Learning Resource Type

Learning Activity

This learning activity is to be used in a grade 10 English Language Arts classroom and will prepare students to analyze and evaluate information presented in graphic texts to draw conclusions, defend claims, and make decisions.  Students will brainstorm different ways information can be displayed in graphic form and evaluate three graphic texts about threatened or endangered species in the United States for clarity, visual appeal, effectiveness, and form. This activity will activate prior knowledge about graphic texts and set the stage for two other learning activities using graphic texts, Graphic Texts in Action and Using Graphic Texts to Make Decisions.

Grade(s)

10

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Learning Activity

Students will share opinions on topics digitally by using mentimeter.com. They will orally share opinions with a partner as they brainstorm reasons they hold the particular opinion. Students will choose from a given list of prompts to provide them with a topic for their opinion writing paragraph. They will use a graphic organizer to plan their writing for the opinion paragraph.

This resource was created in partnership with Dothan City Schools.

Grade(s)

3

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Learning Activity

In this lesson, students will read and critically examine a letter from an Alabama farm owner to a U.S. Senator from Alabama regarding exemption status for the 1917 Selective Service Act on behalf of one of her workers. This primary source document will allow the students to practice evaluating a complex text. The students will answer active reading questions to participate in a "Philosophical Chairs" class debate regarding the merit of the farm owner's request. The Philosophical Chairs activity will allow the students to verbally articulate an argumentative position while specifically using textual evidence to be able to defend their position.

*Note: A bibliography of resources used can be found at the end of the "Lesson Procedures Section" of this lesson.

This lesson was created in partnership with the Alabama Department of Archives and History.

Grade(s)

11

Subject Area

English Language Arts
Social Studies

Learning Resource Type

Lesson Plan

Students compose epitaphs for deceased characters in the play Hamlet, paying particular attention to how their words appeal to the senses, create imagery, suggest mood, and set tone. Using a three-paneled poster board, students design gravestones to display their epitaphs. Students must capture the essence of their characters in their epitaphs, and their poster boards must reflect the themes that support their character's personality and station in life. The resulting projects make compelling hallway displays and provide students with an audience for their writing.

This activity can be easily adapted to another tragedy by changing the characters students write epitaphs about. For instance, students can write epitaphs for Romeo, Juliet, Mercutio, and Tybalt in Romeo and Juliet or write epitaphs for Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, Duncan, and Banquo in Macbeth.

Grade(s)

11

Subject Area

English Language Arts

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource
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