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These time-tested writing prompts are sure to get your middle school students writing! Each day, select a journal prompt that goes with your current area of study. There are 25 categories and 225 prompts from which to choose, truly providing enough variety to frame the writing prompts to your students. Students use prompts containing inspiring quotes, relevant statistics, poetry, well-known dates, and many other attention-getting materials. This provides opportunity to write about personal i

"Broken Chain" and "Oranges" by Gary Soto are great stories to compare! "Broken Chain" is a short narrative story and "Oranges" is a poem. Both are regarding dating and middle-school aged boys. The first task is to summarize. There are a couple of strong comparison questions requiring students to cite examples from the text. This involves students identifying similes and providing meaning for one of them. Additionally, students must figure out words in context and make strong supported infer

This was a fun and unique twist to doing classroom book commercials as book projects. Students use the 100% FREE program called Flipgrid to create and share book commercials or book trailers to entice others to read books! Since I had never used Fligrid before the assignment, I wanted to give students time to be familiar with it and I needed the time, too. Also, it is important to me that students continued to show "text evidence" and understanding of their books in the process steps. So, thi

Quick and ready-to-use, this assignment has my middle school students loving poetry and creating some of their own 'inspired' versions of this classic! This assignment takes the old favorite, 'Twas the Night Before Christmas, and teaches students about poetic devices such as rhythm, rhyme, couplets, and syllables. After learning about this age-old poem, students are given a ten-line start of a poem with a classroom flair inspired by this same poem. Students must finish the poem using rhyming

Yielding authentic writing and a variety of different author responses, this book project is a favorite among my students year after year. With a background of basic letter parts and the writing expectations established during class, this assignment brings it all together. My students write the letter, whether their author is dead or alive. The best part is that students will ask if they can PLEASE write another one to a different author once the book project is over. That is a win-win assig

If you are looking for an authentic learning experience for students to have while learning about Martin Luther King Jr., this is your assignment! I show the "I Have a Dream" speech to my students and we talk about his words. We also discuss his life and different roles briefly before I hand out the following assignment. I found several thought-provoking quotations from Martin Luther King Jr. that were challenging, but accessible to 7th grade students. Students discuss quotations in partn

I use this book project to review and internalize frequently used literary devices. It is based on at standard and above standard and includes more literary elements for those seeking a challenge or an above standard grade. It cements the ideas because students make their own book of definitions with specifically quoted text from their reading and commentary that proves why that piece of evidence works to prove the literary device. It is coupled with pictures to prove their understanding.

This presentation is for weekly student reflection. It contains 31 slides with unique questions for students to answer about independently-read novels. They are complex questions which allow students to show their ability to use higher-level thinking. Students are expected to use direct quotes in their responses with clear commentary explaining how the responses answer the question. Slides can be used in any order!!! The questions align with common core standards! Unlike some questions out t

This short book commercial accomplishes a few goals. First, it helps students write summaries in an interesting and concise manner. Second, it provides clear guidelines for executing a quality speech. Third, it creates a fun project that makes other students want to read more books! Rubrics included! If you find this helpful, please let me know. I'd really appreciate a rating or a follow. I will be posting lessons to match as I create them this school year. :)

This assignment meets two real goals. The first is to have students practice using dialogue correctly. The second is to have students practice getting up in front of their classmates for speeches. After reviewing how to punctuation dialogue, my students draw a number from one to 18 to see which characters they are going to create short conversations for. They are all fun and creative. For example, they may have Russell Wilson and Thor talk about throwing techniques or Santa Claus and Neil Arm

This common core historical fiction book project asks students to revisit specific parts of the novel read and explain how that portion of the novel helped him/her understand more about a certain aspect of history. Because direct citation is required, students cannot "Google" the answer. This is a genre my middle school students love and a useful activity to show learning and critical thinking. Please let me know what you think!

Earnest Hemmingway's "A Day's Wait" is a favorite story I use with my 7th graders each year. This short assignment asks a few quick questions that require students to cite evidence from the story in order to show understanding of theme. Additionally, students must figure out alternative meanings of words and make an inference regarding the meaning of the title. This is a time-tested assignment I pull out for quick review and practice of basic concepts. The story is not included in the assignme

For this book project, each student must synthesize information from a book that literally “sandwiches” many of the basic elements students need to know. Students use the different food parts of a sandwich to display knowledge of setting, theme, characters, personal connections or reflections, imagery, and plot. For this project, I used different colored paper to match the parts of the sandwich corresponding to required knowledge. Students enjoyed putting them together and looking at each oth

This genre study contains everything you need to get started on a genre-based individualized learning adventure. Included: Genre Poster Genre Graph for students to track progress Sticker sheets color-coding genres Genre Identification Page for Students Genre Quiz and Answer Key Parent Volunteer Book Interview Sheet and Rubric Prize Chart This bundle price includes all items I have listed regarding genre at a much-reduced rate! Included for free: The excitement your students will have competi

This excellent source for middle school narrative writing provides students the one thing they crave and desire more than anything else when writing - choice! It includes three well-developed narrative writing prompts. Each prompt allows students to write personal, biographical, or fictional narrative stories. It includes a proven graphic organizer that helps students develop character and plot and a revision checklist that aligns with the common core rubric.

I use this Power Point as an ice breaker the first day of school in my reading and writing class. I begin by demonstrating that when a slide appears that describes something about them, they should stand up and boldly place both hands in the air, yelling, "Hey! That's me!" I do this activity right along with them. It includes learning targets to get to know one another and be able to draw conclusions that we write and share at the end of the time. It helps me know some important informat

This is my favorite way to cover biographical and autobiographical books. The best part is that the kids enjoy it and are writing using specific details and a true 3rd person style. This is complete with a rubric to make the project clear and meaningful. If you find this helpful, please let me know. I'd really appreciate a rating or a follow.

Using the story Rikki Tikki Tavi by Rudyard Kipling, students work on character trait identification citing specific evidence from the text, writing a summary using a provided graphic organizer, and finding and identifying appositives in the text. All include four-point rubrics are included. The story itself is readily available other places, but is not included in this assignment due to copyright.

If you are a middle school teacher who is tired of teaching the kindergarten skill of capitalization regarding the pronoun 'I' this product is for you! It shows clear rules out for the pronoun 'I' and its contractions along with graphics. It also has a tongue-in-cheek section for students to fill in the blank on proper use of the pronoun followed by a signature section for students to promise to use it better. The final portion requires for students to write a paragraph using all forms of t

This quick multiple choice quiz is used to assess whether or not students have the basic ability to identify a book's genre based upon basic characteristics of a book description. It is a quick mini-assessment and includes the answer key.