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Browse results: Writing and Speaking

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RESOURCE GRADE LEVEL MEDIA TYPE
Abraham Lincoln: A Good Man? or A Good Man!

Abraham Lincoln: A Good Man? or A Good Man!

In this lesson, students use video from American Masters: Bill T. Jones: A Good Man along with primary sources to investigate the life of Lincoln and write a one page argument essay on whether Lincoln was "a good man."

9-12

Lesson Plan

Analyzing and Comparing Perspectives on Issues - Gorillas

Analyzing and Comparing Perspectives on Issues - Gorillas

Students compare and contrast their perspectives on raising gorillas in captivity with their peers and with scientists. They summarize their perspectives and the perspectives of others.

5-12

Lesson Plan

Analyzing an Issue From Three Perspectives - Smoking in Public Places

Analyzing an Issue From Three Perspectives - Smoking in Public Places

Students note various perspectives on the debate about smoking in public places in NYC and create an interview to research the perspectives of peers and community members. They write a report to present their findings and opinion on the issue.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Cause and Effect Relationships - Silence of the Bees

Cause and Effect Relationships - Silence of the Bees

Students write an essay that synthesizes the cause and effect relationship the disappearance of bees will cause.

6-8

Lesson Plan

A Character's Perspective - Colonial House

A Character's Perspective - Colonial House

Students watch a video segment that shows the reactions of colonists and native people when they encounter one another for the first time during a colony settlement reenactment. Students then select a character and write a letter from that character’s point of view that describes the meeting.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Character Development: Cancer - A New Treatment

Character Development: Cancer - A New Treatment

Students will answer questions about what motivated chemical engineer Mark Davis to search for a better treatment for his wife's cancer. They then complete a journal entry in which they compare his motivations and goals to those they’ve established for themselves.

6-12

Lesson Plan

Character Motivation - Sapelo Island Culture

Character Motivation - Sapelo Island Culture

Students write a poem (using simile and flashback) about the culture of Sapelo Island. They read their poems for an audience.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Collecting and Organizing Facts From Multiple Sources - Flowering Plants

Collecting and Organizing Facts From Multiple Sources - Flowering Plants

Students take notes on two videos about flowering plants and organize the information to write a cohesive essay about the topic.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Compare and Contrast Information from Multiple Sources - Wolong's Pandas

Compare and Contrast Information from Multiple Sources - Wolong's Pandas

Students compare and contrast information from three sources to determine the reasons that contributed to panda population decline.  They draw conclusions from these sources by writing their own paragraphs.

5-7

Lesson Plan

Comparing and Contrasting - Explorers of Yesterday and Today

Comparing and Contrasting - Explorers of Yesterday and Today

Students write essays that compare and contrast two explorers of Yellowstone National Park, Tom Murphy, a modern day explorer and photographer and John Colter, an explorer who traveled across the same area almost 200 years ago.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Comparing and Contrasting Information and Forming an Opinion - Santiago and Morris

Comparing and Contrasting Information and Forming an Opinion - Santiago and Morris

Students use a T-Chart to take notes and then write a compare/contrast paragraph about a therapy dog.

5-7

Lesson Plan

Condense, Combine or Categorize New Information - Your Brain and Moral Decision-Making

Condense, Combine or Categorize New Information - Your Brain and Moral Decision-Making

Students watch a video showing an experiment on how the brain responds when making moral decisions. They then synthesize information to create a summary paragraph that describes the experiment and the conclusions presented.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Connections Between Texts - Maya Lin and Jane Jacobs

Connections Between Texts - Maya Lin and Jane Jacobs

Students write and perform a Readers’ Theater script in which two characters, Maya Lin and Jane Jacobs, talk to each other about their ideas about architecture and life.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Connections to Personal Experiences - Bees? Yikes!

Connections to Personal Experiences - Bees? Yikes!

Students make connections between a video about bees and their own personal experiences through a poem written for two voices.

5-7

Lesson Plan

Creating a Hypothesis - The Intelligent Robot

Creating a Hypothesis - The Intelligent Robot

Students watch a video segment that discusses developing intelligent robots, and then write paragraphs that provide detailed hypotheses of results that could come from this endeavor.

6-12

Lesson Plan

Creating Literary Texts - Finding Homes for Pets

Creating Literary Texts - Finding Homes for Pets

Students write and illustrate a persuasive book to convince readers to adopt a pet.

5-7

Lesson Plan

Describing Characters - Cloud Grows

Describing Characters - Cloud Grows

Students learn about characterization by studying and taking notes on the growth of a white stallion.

5-12

Lesson Plan

Designing a Poster to Communicate Information: Yellowstone National Park

Designing a Poster to Communicate Information: Yellowstone National Park

While watching a short video segment about Yellowstone National Park, students take notes they later use to create an interesting and infomative poster.

3-6

Lesson Plan

Determining Main Idea and Supporting Details - Wild in the City

Determining Main Idea and Supporting Details - Wild in the City

Students use a graphic organizer to record important details and determine the main idea of a video segment. They use the organizer to write an informational paragraph about parakeets in the city.

4-7

Lesson Plan

Developing Supporting Ideas - A Garden Grows in Brooklyn

Developing Supporting Ideas - A Garden Grows in Brooklyn

Students design and draw a garden and give reasons to support why their garden is important to the neighborhood.

3-6

Lesson Plan

Drawing Conclusions - Miss Navajo

Drawing Conclusions - Miss Navajo

Students watch a video documenting the Navajo language portion of the Miss Navajo Nation beauty contest, determine the main responsibilities of the winner of Miss Navajo Nation and complete graphic organizers to write paragraphs that highlight these details and explain their inferences.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Drawing Conclusions and Comparing/Contrasting - The Everglades

Drawing Conclusions and Comparing/Contrasting - The Everglades

Students take notes to determine the most important information given in a video segment and written text. They compare the information and draw written conclusions about the importance of studying the pig frog and the Everglades.

4-8

Lesson Plan

Following Directions - Ndakinna Wilderness Project

Following Directions - Ndakinna Wilderness Project

Students create a diagram with captions and a drawing to communicate information about camouflaging.

5-8

Lesson Plan

Forming an Opinion with Organizational Elements - Cats, Yesterday and Today

Forming an Opinion with Organizational Elements - Cats, Yesterday and Today

Students use a graphic organizer to list facts about the role of cats throughout history. They then write a paragraph stating an informed opinion about cats' most important role.

5-12

Lesson Plan

How Different Authors Treat Similar Themes - Elephants of Africa

How Different Authors Treat Similar Themes - Elephants of Africa

Students take notes of the details of two different documentaries on similar themes. They use their notes to write a script and devise storyboards for their own documentary about elephants.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Identifying Characteristics - Anansi, the Spider

Identifying Characteristics - Anansi, the Spider

Students identify the specific traits of Anansi, a popular character in African folklore, by completing a character web.

2-5

Lesson Plan

Identifying Cultural Influences - City Horses

Identifying Cultural Influences - City Horses

Students determine how culture influences a group of people’s involvement with horses and write a story in response to the video.

4-6

Lesson Plan

Identifying Different Kinds of Sentences - The Peacock’s Feathers

Identifying Different Kinds of Sentences - The Peacock’s Feathers

Using a chart, students identify four sentence types within a short summary.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Identifying Important and Unimportant Details - An Ornithologist's Job

Identifying Important and Unimportant Details - An Ornithologist's Job

Students distinguish between important and unimportant details and, acting as news reporters, write an article about the job of an ornithologist.

4-8

Lesson Plan

Identifying Information - The Dogon of Africa

Identifying Information - The Dogon of Africa

Students complete a chart to categorize information and identify missing, conflicting, unclear, and irrelevant information in a video.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Identifying Social, Cultural, and Historical Perspectives - Dogs That Changed the World

Identifying Social, Cultural, and Historical Perspectives - Dogs That Changed the World

Students identify social, cultural, and historical perspectives regarding the importance of dogs in the past and present. They write and illustrate list poems that incorporate each perspective.

5-8

Lesson Plan

Identifying the Social and Cultural Context of a Period - The New Negro and the Harlem Renaissance

Identifying the Social and Cultural Context of a Period - The New Negro and the Harlem Renaissance

Students write an essay summarizing the social and cultural changes in African American life and attitudes during the Harlem Renaissance.

6-8

Lesson Plan

The Importance of Setting to a Story - Pesky Critters

The Importance of Setting to a Story - Pesky Critters

Students take notes on a video segment and write an essay detailing how setting (time, place and environment) influence a story.

4-6

Lesson Plan

Interpreting Characters, Setting, Plot, and Theme - The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Disaster

Interpreting Characters, Setting, Plot, and Theme - The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Disaster

Students watch a video segment chronicling the tragic fire at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory. Using a story elements graphic organizer, students determine the various elements of the story and arrange them in the correct order on the organizer.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Making Predictions - The Injured Otter

Making Predictions - The Injured Otter

Students watch a video segment that shows a young injured otter’s attempts to locate his missing family. Then they predict what happens next and then write a narrative account of these events from three possible points of view: the injured otter, the filmmaker or an animal behaviorist.

6-10

Lesson Plan

Perspectives of the Gullah Geechee People - Sapelo Island

Perspectives of the Gullah Geechee People - Sapelo Island

Students use information they record on a Speaker Graphic Organizer to write a paragraph about the perspectives of the Gullah Geechee People.

5-8

Lesson Plan

Point of View - Sharing a Perspective on Music

Point of View - Sharing a Perspective on Music

Students share their opinions on music and write two critiques of a band playing the “St. Louis Blues,” one from their own point of view and one from that of a music critic. They reflect upon how their point of view influenced their opinion.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Point of View - Rhinoceros

Point of View - Rhinoceros

Students write a journal entry in which they imagine themselves as the rhinoceros and describe its journey to a new preserve.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Producing Clear Directions - Trackers

Producing Clear Directions - Trackers

Students write directions for how to make and use a tracking stick. Peers test and assess the clarity of the directions.

4-7

Lesson Plan

Public Speaking and Persuasion -  Improve Your School!

Public Speaking and Persuasion - Improve Your School!

Students will then describe ways in which they would like to improve their school by making an oral presentation to persuade the audience to agree with their ideas. Students are evaluated on their public speaking skills and their ability to be persuasive.

6-12

Lesson Plan

Reading Charts and Tables – Garden Spiders

Reading Charts and Tables – Garden Spiders

Students read a chart that reflects information about garden spiders in the segment and then answer a series of questions using the chart.

3-5

Lesson Plan

Recording Information to Write a Report - Kids Who Volunteer in Their Communities

Recording Information to Write a Report - Kids Who Volunteer in Their Communities

Students write a report on kids’ volunteer activities.

3-6

Lesson Plan

Reporting from Multiple Sources - The Roles of Dogs in Three Societies

Reporting from Multiple Sources - The Roles of Dogs in Three Societies

Students take notes to organize relevant facts and ideas from three video segments about the roles dogs play in different cultures or societies. They use their notes to write a multi-paragraph essay.

5-8

Lesson Plan

Storytelling: Oral Traditions

Storytelling: Oral Traditions

Students talk about what makes a good story, look at the oral tradition of storytelling, and compare and contrast stories from two different cultural traditions. This is one of four storytelling lessons.

4-6

Lesson Plan

Storytelling: Tales of Everyday Life

Storytelling: Tales of Everyday Life

Students explore how events from everyday life can become stories, and how different types of narratives—such as ships' logs and journals—can tell the story of the same event. This is one of four storytelling lessons.

4-6

Lesson Plan

Storytelling: Writers' Workshop

Storytelling: Writers' Workshop

Students draw on their understanding of different types of narratives to inspire and enrich their own storytelling. This is one of four storytelling lessons.

4-6

Lesson Plan

Summarizing - Squirrel Rehabilitation

Summarizing - Squirrel Rehabilitation

Students use a graphic organizer to summarize important information from a video segment. They use their notes to write a summary of the video segment.

4-7

Lesson Plan

Summary, Symbolism and Levels of Meaning - The Healing Totem

Summary, Symbolism and Levels of Meaning - The Healing Totem

Students write a summary of a video segment and then rewrite it after a discussion of the video’s symbolism. They reflect on how an understanding of the symbolism influenced their ability to summarize and comprehend the segment.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Supporting Opinions - Ken from Japan

Supporting Opinions - Ken from Japan

Students write an essay that expresses and supports their opinions about how their schooling compares to a Japanese student’s.

6-8

Lesson Plan

Use of Symbolism to Convey the Author's Message - The Negro Speaks of Rivers

Use of Symbolism to Convey the Author's Message - The Negro Speaks of Rivers

Students identify and interpret literary devices, symbolism and first-person narration as well as answer critical thinking questions and write a paragraph about a Langston Hughes poem.

6-8

Lesson Plan

RESULTS 1-50 OF 58

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