Add a little fun to ANY novel, play, short story, or history unit with this worksheet where students choose a character (or historic figure) and fill a fictional cell phone with email messages, playlist entries, and a wallpaper image.This PDF file and Google Drive version includes a blank form and a completed sample to show students, if you wish. The sample is from my students’ study of To Kill a Mockingbird, showing Scout Finch’s cell phone content, but you could use this worksheet with ANY wor

Help your high school and advanced middle school students win their written arguments with these easy-to-follow essay writing materials. This bundle of interactive, step-by-step materials inspires even my most reluctant students to put pen to paper. Activities/handouts featuring modern design elements will guide your students as they learn to craft their own meaningful and effective argumentative essays. Easy prep for you; excellent growth for your students’ writing skills.Just print and teach!I

Enjoy this MASSIVE bundle of beautifully designed materials that will take your class through Harper Lee’s classic American novel, To Kill a Mockingbird. Everything you’ll need is here; just add a class set of To Kill a Mockingbird novels, a classroom with internet access, and you’re good to go.This HUGE bundle includes:• A day-by-day calendar to follow with helpful details and nightly homework assignments (read this file first when you open the bundle)• Suggested procedure for how to address th

Looking for a fresh approach to pull your students into Romeo and Juliet? William Shakespeare’s timeless tale of tragic love will enthrall your students when you use this collection of five weeks of lesson materials designed to challenge and entertain advanced middle school students and high school freshmen/sophomores.This Romeo & Juliet unit is one of my favorites of the year. I’ve used it successfully with eighth graders and both regular and honors freshmen.This bundle includes:• A day-by-

Micro Fiction – Flash Fiction – Two-Sentence Stories – Sudden Fiction – Twitter TalesWhatever you want to call them, super-short stories are a super-fun way to spend a single class period as you introduce teens to the idea that an entire story can exist within just two sentences.Use this 20-slide overview lecture with eight compelling examples from four different genres (drama, horror, sci fi, and romance) to get your students’ creative wheels turning. (Slide deck is included in Prezi, PDF, and

Make your Great Gatsby unit the favorite of the year with this MASSIVE bundle of materials that will take your class through FOUR FULL WEEKS OF COMPLETE LESSONS covering F. Scott Fitzgerald’s classic novel. Everything you’ll need is here; just add a class set of The Great Gatsby novels and you’re good to go.This HUGE bundle includes:• A day-by-day calendar to follow with helpful details and nightly homework assignments (read this file first when you open the bundle) (2-page PDF)• An introductory

Enjoy this bundle of thoughtful materials designed to take your students through four weeks of lessons covering John Steinbeck’s classic novel, Of Mice and Men. Everything you’ll need is here – just add a class set of novels and you’re good to go.This Of Mice and Men bundle includes:• A day-by-day calendar to follow with helpful details and nightly homework assignments (read this file first when you open the bundle) • An extended metaphor activity that helps familiarize students with John Steinb

*EDITABLE* A Year of Journal Prompts Bell Ringers or Exit Slips Bundle includes: Over 400 writing prompts aligned with the ELA Common Core Standards for reading, writing, speaking and listening, language, and history strands. The prompts are provided in Powerpoint and in Microsoft Word, so they are completely editable and perfect for distance learning! NOTE: If you are looking for a version of the prompts already formatted in Google Drive, they are here: JOURNAL PROMPTS in GOOGLE SLIDESThis IS i

Happy 2022! My New Year's Activities pack is updated yearly and includes creative prompts for resolutions, goals, poems, growth mindset, creative activities, a scavenger hunt, and has print-and-go pages as well as interactive notebook activities to promote critical thinking and a growth mindset. This includes DIGITAL versions in Google Slides and in Easel so you can use ALL of the activities for distance learning!Students will enjoy these critical-thinking and creative activities; the activities

Research paper complete unit. Research papers made easy! This complete unit has everything you need to teach writing a research paper from start to finish. Includes NEW MLA 8th edition citation guidelines. For the APA version of this unit, click here: Research Papers Complete Unit - APA Style Everything here is classroom-tested with hundreds of students who have successfully written a research paper. There are 65 pages of teacher notes, handouts, worksheets, activities and examples, all

Help your high school and advanced middle school students get creative with this eight-day Personal Narrative essay writing mini-unit. Featuring models of one professional and three exemplar student-written personal narrative essays, this bundle of step-by-step materials will inspire even reluctant students to put pen to paper. Activities/handouts featuring modern design elements and dynamic lecture materials will guide your students to craft their own meaningful autobiographical incident essays

Teach your students proper email etiquette – or "email netiquette" – with this 45-minute "How to Email" lesson that includes a high-interest introductory lecture and two fun real-world writing activities.First, present the right and wrong way to build an email message with a dynamic 15-slide lecture (Prezi, PDF, and Google Slides versions included). Then, assign students to evaluate four sample emails sent by high school students seeking a summer internship. Finally, have students work individua

Argument essay writing is easier to teach when you have an EDITABLE unit with well-written mentor texts and a step-by-step process. Students will LOVE this argument essay writing unit, as well as the real-life application and mentor texts included here.Update 1: I included 40 editable pages, a Google Drive link to the entire argumentative essay unit, and an extra rubric! As of January 2021, the digital file is even more interactive.Update 2: Buyers have been asking for at-a-glance lesson plans j

OUTSIDERS: This Outsiders Novel Study Unit now includes both a print and digital version for distance learning! Engage your students with standards-based literacy activities as they read S.E. Hinton's classic novel. The Chapter-by-Chapter Response Pages challenge students to dig deep into the text to analyze and make inferences. Perfect for partner work, small groups, or independent study! The Free-Writes topics facilitate great discussions, and students enjoy choice on the essay and creative wr

This research writing unit and portfolio has everything you need to teach the research process in an organized and engaging way! Your students will strengthen their reading, writing, and researching skills throughout the research project.This comprehensive portfolio will help your students master the research writing process in 6 steps-- indicated by organized tabs (topic selection, research, annotated bibliography, research outline, the writing process, and reflection).This resource was updated

If your students can’t go an hour without looking at their phones, they need to read “The Veldt.”Ray Bradbury’s chilling futuristic short story, “The Veldt,” gives us a glimpse of a world where children love their devices more than their families. Sound familiar? This compelling 90-minute lesson will get your students reading, thinking, and discussing the consequences of our tech-dependent culture. The materials (5-page PDF with links to online media and Google Drive versions of all student hand

Use the classic short story, “The Most Dangerous Game” by Richard Connell to teach your students the elements of literary analysis. This three-day lesson plan includes the full-text 9-page story (public domain), an 8-question student handout (with detailed answer key/class discussion starters), a simile hunt worksheet (also with answer key), and an optional direct/indirect characterization activity. All student handouts are included in both PDF and Google Drive formats.This lesson is best for ad

RACE writing strategy to help students answer passage-based, short response questions in a formal style, with using clear reasons and evidence from the text, and to provide concluding statements. These informational texts are quick, easy reads, so that your students can focus on writing. Do you have a wide range of readers? This money-saving bundle combines three of best-selling products, giving you 40 passages that range from 4th grade to 9th grade reading level. Perfect for special education,

Looking for a fresh approach to pull your students into The Tragedy of Julius Caesar? William Shakespeare’s timeless tale of political intrigue will thrill your students when you use this MASSIVE bundle of high-interest lessons. This package includes FIVE WEEKS OF COMPLETE LESSON MATERIALS designed to challenge and entertain students in grades nine through twelve.This HUGE bundle includes:• A day-by-day calendar to follow with helpful details and nightly homework assignments (read this file firs

This product contains 10 ready-to-use passages and short response questions to guide students through the use of the RACE strategy. RACE is a writing strategy to help students answer passage-based, short response questions in a formal style, with using clear reasons and text evidence, and to provide concluding statements. → Need a GOOGLE SLIDES compatible version? CLICK HERE!Why use the RACE strategy? This mnemonic device is especially helpful for struggling writers and students with disabilitie

By pairing an engaging 43-minute video with a rich question/answer activity, students will have a meaningful class experience – even on a sub day. This lesson features a viewing of Billions in Change, a high-quality documentary readily available for streaming at multiple online sources, and critical thinking questions that focus on 5-Hour Energy founder Manoj Bhargava and his pledge to use 99 percent of his $4 billion empire to help solve the global problems of energy, fresh water, and disease p

The Outsiders by S.E. HintonGrab every eye in the room with this gorgeous 38-slide introduction lecture that provides all of the background information your class will need as you launch your study of S.E. Hinton’s classic novel, The Outsiders.The presentation includes a quickwrite topic that will help make The Outsiders’ characters and themes relevant to your students (15 minutes for writing and discussion). Then, launch the 30-minute lecture which covers S.E. Hinton’s background, the time peri

UPDATE – You can learn more about this writing contest at my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46cEHf0UoOUTired of grading endless stacks of essays? Want to lighten your grading load while still having students write and receive meaningful feedback on their work? The answer is to host this writing competition.Students enter their writing into a series of peer-review competitions during this week-long activity. The beauty of this five-day lesson plan, which can work with any novel,

Use these creative lesson materials to help your teens get excited about studying Puritan minister Jonathan Edwards’ most famous sermon, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.” When you connect this 1741 lecture to modern elements, such as heavy metal lyrics from bands such as Metallica and Slayer (school appropriate selections, of course), your kids will be aching to dig into the fire and brimstone of Edwards’ ghastly sermon. Just warn them – Edwards’ imagery isn’t for the faint of heart!These