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ALEX Lesson Plans
Subject: English Language Arts (6), or English Language Arts (6), or Science (6), or Technology Education (6 - 8)
Title: Washed Away
Description: In this lesson, students will learn about water erosion. They will view pictures and videos, complete drawings, and work in collaborative groups as they research types of water erosion (rill, gully, sheet, and channel). Students will also connect water erosion to deposition.This lesson plan was created as a result of the Girls Engaged in Math and Science, GEMS Project funded by the Malone Family Foundation.
Thinkfinity Lesson Plans
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Star Wars creator George Lucas was born in 1944.
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Description: Students use the Hero's Journey interactive to describe how Luke Skywalker meets each stage of his journey, and then brainstorm other works that use the formula.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Peer Review: Narrative
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Description: This minilesson guides student in using the PQP technique Praise - Question - Polish to offer concrete and useful peer review feedback.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts,Social Studies
Title: The Poet's Voice: Langston Hughes and You
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Description: This unit of seven lessons, from EDSITEment, introduces students to a poet's voice. Students develop a general definition of voice in poetry, and analyze and appreciate the poetic voice of Langston Hughes in particular. Included are writing and discussion activities, in which students either write a poem expressing their own voice (as developed in a journal), or write about one of the qualities of Langston Hughes's poetic voice (as explored in class discussion).
Thinkfinity Partner: EDSITEment
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: In 1939, Marian Anderson was denied permission to sing at Constitution Hall.
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Description: Students view Eleanor Roosevelt's resignation letter to the DAR in response to Andersen being denied permission to sing. Students write a letter to a newspaper editor about social injustice.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Cosmic Oranges: Observation and Inquiry Through Descriptive Writing and Art
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Description: Students will eat up this lesson about oranges as they practice the skills that help them investigate and make detailed observations for descriptive purposes.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Creative Writing Through Wordless Picture Books
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Description: Students are exposed to wordless picture books and begin developing story lines, both orally and in writing, using an online, interactive story map.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Avalanche, Aztek, or Bravada? A Connotation Minilesson
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Description: Students examine familiar car names for underlying connotations then proceed through a series of steps, increasing their control over language, until they select words with powerful connotations in their own writing.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Proverbs: At Home and around the World
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Description: In this lesson, students work with proverbs from home and from around the world, exploring how these maxims are tied to a cultures values and everyday experience.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: April is National Poetry Month!
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Description: Students are assigned to be '' poets of the day'' and are provided several models to create, illustrate, and present their different poems to the class.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: K,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Sally Ride, first American woman in space, was born in 1951.
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Description: After exploring information about Sally Ride on the StarKids Who's Who site, students write a letter using the Letter Generator to Dr. Ride.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 3,4,5,6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Picture Books as Framing Texts: Research Paper Strategies for Struggling Writers
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Description: Students use picture books as framing texts for research, freeing them from the language of encyclopedia sources and allowing them to focus their attention on the content of their papers.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Ezra Jack Keats was born on this day in 1916.
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Description: In celebration of Keats' birthday, students write stories that include some characters from Keats' books and practice using collage techniques with the Collage Machine.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: K,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Promoting Diversity in the Classroom and School Library through Social Action
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Description: Students explore the effects of stereotypes by analyzing children's books. Then they create bookmarks that encourage readers to question the assumptions of stereotyped books and to seek out matching, balanced texts.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: E-pals Around the World
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Description: With e-pals, students develop real-life writing and social experiences, learn the format of a friendly letter and parts of an e-mail message, and discover other cultures, languages, and geographic areas.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Author Garc -a M rquez was born on this day.
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Description: Students take place in a collaborative creative writing activity to begin to understand the hallmarks of the literary style known as magical realism.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Using QARs to Develop Comprehension and Reflective Reading Habits
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Description: Students are introduced to question-answer relationships (QARs). Using the QAR strategy, students identify different types of questions and learn how to determine the appropriate response for each question type.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Exploring Free Speech and Persuasion with Nothing But the Truth
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Description: Students read Avi's Nothing But the Truth and examine the First Amendment and student rights, and then decide whether the rights of the novel's protagonist, Philip, are violated.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Today is World Hello Day!
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Description: Students study a letter written by a famous author to determine purpose, and words and phrases that make the letter meaningful. They can use the Letter Generator to write their own letter promoting peace.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Investigating the Holocaust: A Collaborative Inquiry Project
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Description: Students explore a variety of resources as they learn about the Holocaust. Working collaboratively, they investigate the materials, prepare oral responses, and produce a topic-based newspaper to complete their research.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: America celebrates Thanksgiving Day today.
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Description: After reading the book '' Thank You, Sarah: The Woman Who Saved Thanksgiving'' , students read the letter Hale sent to Lincoln and brainstorm a list of ways to make their community better.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Heroes Around Us
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Description: Students select, read about, and report on a hero and then identify how their hero matches certain criteria and characteristics. Hero reports are then compiled into a class book.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Reading and Writing Workshop: Freak the Mighty
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Description: Students use a variety of reading and writing strategies as they read Rodman Philbrick's Freak the Mighty.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Choose Your Own Adventure: A Hypertext Writing Experience
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Description: Students analyze '' choose your own adventure'' stories and brainstorm to develop setting, characters, and plots for their own adventures stories and related Websites.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Proverbs: Contemporary Proverbs
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Description: This lesson challenges students to craft more apparent meanings for traditional maxims by updating proverbs from around the world and writing proverbs of their own.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: On this day in 1907, Rachel Carson was born.
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Description: Students learn about Rachel Carson, explore different environmental websites, and write a Diamante Poem about a particular habitat.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Book Report Alternative: Comic Strips and Cartoon Squares
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Description: Students must think critically to create comic strips highlighting six important scenes from a book they have read.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Imagine That! Playing with Genre through Newspapers and Short Stories
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Description: Students identify genre characteristics for short stories and newspaper articles then practice both genres by turning a short story into a news article and an article into a short story.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: On this date in 1901, Andrew Carnegie gave $5.2 million to New York City libraries.
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Description: Students write expository and persuasive pieces with the help of the Persuasion Map and Essay Map interactives, and compare the essential features of the two modes of writing.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Celebrate Halloween!
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Description: Students research information on Halloween, create masks or costumes from a text they are reading, or write a narrative essay describing their best Halloween ever.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 3,4,5,6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Today is Native American writer Leslie Marmon Silko's birthday.
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Description: Students revive elements of the oral tradition by writing about something funny that happened to them recently, sharing with classmates, and discussing the changes that occur during the retelling of the stories.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: She Did What? Revising for Connotation
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Description: Did she walk, skip, amble, dance? In this minilesson, students explore connotation by acting out and revising the simple sentence '' She walked into the room.''
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: The Lewis and Clark Expedition reached the Pacific Ocean in 1805.
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Description: Students look at Kenneth Holder's paintings of the Lewis and Clark trail and transform their notes into a descriptive paragraph as if they were a member of the expedition.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: A Pictures Worth a Thousand Words: From Image to Detailed Narrative
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Description: The old clich ' , , , '' A picture is worth a thousand words'' is put to the test when students write their own narrative interpretations of events shown in an image.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Louisa May Alcott was born in 1832.
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Description: Students brainstorm important events and people that might serve as the beginning of an interesting piece of writing. They then use the Bio-Cube to plan their writing and write an essay about a memorable person.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Action Is Character: Exploring Character Traits with Adjectives
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Description: Students must '' become'' a character in a novel in order to describe themselves and other characters using powerful adjectives.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Veterans Day is celebrated in the United States today.
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Description: Students write biographical poems about a soldier.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: In 1847, Bram Stoker, the author of Dracula was born.
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Description: Students brainstorm the superstitions they know and small groups research one of the superstitions to determine its origin and meaning or purpose. Students can write about the superstition using the Mystery Cube interactive.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Susan B. Anthony voted on this date in 1872, leading to her arrest.
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Description: After assigning special privileges to an arbitrarily designated group, students write about how they felt during the simulation and consider what they might be willing to do to change an unjust law.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Poems That Tell a Story: Narrative and Persona in the Poetry of Robert Frost
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Description: In this four-lesson unit, from EDSITEment, students read, discuss, and analyze selected poems by Robert Frost. The activities that make up this unit encourage students to draw inferences about a poem's speaker based on evidence contained within the poem and to gather evidence supporting those inferences.
Thinkfinity Partner: EDSITEment
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Inquiry on the Internet: Evaluating Web Pages for a Class Collection
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Description: Students use Internet search engines and Web analysis checklists to evaluate online resources then write annotations that explain how and why the resources will be valuable to the class.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Biography Project: Research and Class Presentation
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Description: Classroom biography study offers high-interest reading with a purpose, as students begin with inquiry and research, summarize and organize their information, and prepare oral presentations to share with the class.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Expository Escapade Detectives Handbook
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Description: Students create a Detective's Handbook based on a detective mystery they have read. The handbooks include expository and descriptive writing, as well as a letter.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
Subject: Language Arts
Title: Inside or Outside? A Minilesson on Quotation Marks and More
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Description: Students often question whether a punctuation mark goes inside or outside the quotation marks, especially when writing dialogue. This lesson helps students identify the conventions and apply them to their text.
Thinkfinity Partner: ReadWriteThink
Grade Span: 6,7,8
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