Haven't tried a book tasting with your students yet? This fun reading activity is an awesome way to introduce genres in your elementary classroom or library!

If you teach writing to K-5 learners, this book list has over 15 books to help you teach young writers all about the writing process.

Procedural writing or "How-to" is one of my favorite units! Read this post to discover some fantastic mentor texts to use in your classroom!

Picture books make wonderful mentor texts to quickly teach middle school and high school students expository writing creatively. Great lesson ideas here!

Looking for unique post-reading activities to inspire students and provide a sample of their analytical skills? Find high-interest strategies for secondary.

Independent reading is a great way to help students build a love of reading! These 5 strategies help hold students accountable!

Free Mad Libs for kids to enjoy. Mad Libs for kids to download and enjoy. Grab your free printable Mad Libs PDFs and get ready to laugh!

Independent reading is a great way to help students build a love of reading! These 5 strategies help hold students accountable!

In upper grade classrooms, students spend a great deal of time responding to the texts they read. Over the years I have found that no matter what grade level I teach, students have a difficult time writing thorough and meaningful reading responses. At the start of every year my students need quite a bit of guidance when writing their responses. One of the best ways that I have found to teach students to write meaningful responses is by providing them with sentence frames. I like to encourage students to follow three simple steps when writing reading responses, each with sentence frames and prompts to use: Step 1: What did you read? While reading... In chapter __ of... On page __ of... During today's reading of... Step 2: What happened in the text? Tell what a character said. Tell what a character did. Tell what a character thought, felt, or learned. Describe the setting. Describe an important event that occurred. Explain a problem that was encountered. Step 3: What did you think? This made me think... This made me realize... Based on this, I can infer... Based on this, I can predict... This reminded me of... I can relate to this because... I could visualize... I now understand... This three-step process encourages students to not only tell what happened in a text, but also reflect on what they thought or felt about what they read. Here is a sample response using these steps: I have included a FREE handout for you to share with your students to help guide them in writing thorough and meaningful reading responses. Click HERE download this FREEBIE. If you are looking for more resources for reading response, check out my Reading Response Journals for literature and non-fiction texts. These resources include anchor charts for different reading strategies and skills, as well as more specific sentence frames for the different skills. Click on the pics to learn more. Writing thoughtful reading responses is not always easy, but with a bit of guidance from using sentence frames and prompts, it will soon become second nature for students!!

A free comic strip template for Elephant and Piggie books, plus a set of super cute Elephant and Piggie paper bag puppet templates.

Generally, when we think of book reports, we think of fiction reading response. However, nonfiction book report templates serve equally as important of a purpose for digging deep into nonfiction texts. Book reports are such

I had so much fun with our Non-Fiction Cereal Box Book Reports, I decided to make one for any Fiction book! My students had a great time creating these! It is a simple, fun way to do a book report. There are two options to choose from, one primary and one geared toward intermediate. The elements include: Title Page: Draw your own cover for the book Characters & Traits: Identify main characters and give each a trait Setting: Draw the main setting Plot: Primary- beginning, middle, end. Intermediate- Conflict/Resolution, Rising Action, Falling Action, Climax, and Summary Making Connections: Text-to-text/self/world Theme/Lessons Learned A New Ending: Create an alternate ending Meet the Author If you like this, check out my store for the Non-Fiction version! Follow me for FREEBIES!

Use these free printable Parts of a Book Poster & Worksheet to teach your pre-readers about book awareness and concepts of print.

I don’t know about you, but some years, books will sit on my shelves collecting dust unless I push them out for my students to see. However, sometimes even highlighting titles doesn’t help, because the book covers are outdated, or the books are worn. What’s a teacher to do? BOOK RECOMMENDATION BEGINNINGS This year I […]

Happy Saturday Friends! Today is officially my first day of Spring Break! I wanted to share something I did with my students to motiv...

I've put together 30 poetry activities for reading poetry, writing poems, and incorporating poetry into your other subjects and lesson plans.

Tunnel books are fun and unique! We made ours using a postcard for a prompt and wrote a haiku to go with it. I've made these with grade 4 and up, but younger students could enjoy this activity in "centers", with the help of parent volunteers, or by having the various parts prepped for them ahead of time. There are lots of different directions you could take this project. We added a pocket on the back for holding a written story that we added later. See a few of our student examples below!For a convenient step-by-step pdf of this lesson, visit my TPT Store

No more boring book reports! Check out 26+ FUN, creative and unique book report ideas and free printable projects too!

Teaching growth mindset can be done with read-alouds! Rosie's Glasses is a great book for this. Get ideas for using this book to teach being positive.

1. Attach an image (photo, magazine, etc.) to a notebook page and write about it. 2. What things will people in the future say about how we live now? (Examples: They ate that? They believed that?) 3. Pick one from each list to make a creature and animal combination. Now write a short story or scene in which this creature appears. List 1 List 2 Vampire porcupine Ninja armadillo Zombie pig Pirate goat Mummy lobster Clown possum Banshee shark Wraith moray eel 4. Imagine a future in which we each have a personalized robot servant. What would yours be like? What would it do? What features would it have? 5. What does your name mean? Free write about names: names you like, names you don’t, how a name can affect a person’s life, how you feel about your own name, why your parents chose your name, etc. 6. Create a brand new holiday with its own traditions, rituals, foods, and activities. 7. What road-trip would you take if you suddenly could? Write about it. 8. List six true sentences that begin with the words “I'll never forget…” 9. Imagine that we lost all electricity, water, and gas for a month without any time to prepare. Write about how your life would change and how you would survive. 10. Make your bucket list for the next 5 years, the next 10 years, and for life. 11. Tell this story: “Well, I thought it was going to be a regular summer doing all our regular things…” 12. List 10 places in the world that you would most like to visit, 10 places you’ve been, and 10 places you would never want to go. 13. Think about hospitality in your family. What’s it like to have guests in your house? Do you prefer to have friends to your house or to go to a friend’s house? 14. Pick a family member of two and write about his or her reputation in your family, or tell a family legend. 15. A guitar pick, a red balloon, and a wicker basket. Write a scene or a poem that includes these three objects. 16. What animal would judge us the most? Write a scene (based on truth or fiction) where two or more people are doing something silly, and they're being observed and criticized by animals. 17. Write about your own worst family vacation memory. 18. Write about your best family vacation memory. 19. Imagine that someone says to you, “Because that's how we've always done it!” Write this out as a scene. (Think: Who said it, what were the circumstances, how did you respond, etc.) 20. What do you think about when you can't sleep? Turn it into a piece of writing. 21. What traditions does your family have? List all of them or just pick one and write about it. 22. Think about your strongest emotion right now (irritation, boredom, happiness, contentment, etc.) and find five quotes about this emotion. 23. What do you struggle with the most? Write about it. 24. Write a self-portrait. 25. What can we learn from contrast? Write a description of something very dark (like a crow) in a very light place (like a field of snow). Make the dark thing seem innocent and the light thing seem ominous. 26. Write about someone who has no enemies. Is it even possible? 27. Think of a person from your past who really deserved a good scolding but never got one. Write a fictional piece where you tell that person off intelligently. 28. Can honesty honestly be bad? Write about someone, fact or fiction, who gets in trouble for being too truthful. 29. The word “fat” carries a negative connotation. Write a story or observation where something fat is celebrated. 30. What animal lives beneath your human skin? A mouse? A cougar? Or what? Explain with writing. 31. Write about the best piece of advice you ever received. 32. Remember a favorite book from your childhood. Write a scene that includes you and an old copy of that book you find somewhere. --> 33. “I was so mortified, I wanted to crawl in a hole!” Write a short narrative (fiction or nonfiction) where this is your first sentence. Illustrate it if you want. 34. Should books ever be banned? Discuss. If no, explain why. You might want to look at a least of commonly banned books. If yes, explain under what circumstances. 35. Ernest Hemingway said to “write hard and clear about what hurts.” Write about something that hurts, whether it’s an emotional, physical, or phantom pain. 36. What if everyone had to wear a shirt with his or her Myers-Briggs personality type on it? What would this change? How would this affect the way people interact with each other? Would you like this or hate it? (If you don’t know your “type,” try this site. 37. William Shakespeare wrote that: “Conversation should be pleasant without scurrility, witty without affectation, free without indecency, learned without conceitedness, novel without falsehood.” Write your thoughts about conversation, or make up dialogue between two characters who are meeting each other for the first time in an unexpected place. 38. Tell this story: “There it was, finally. Our island. Our very own island. It looked beautiful above the waves of fog, but there was still one question to be answered: why had they sold it to us for only five dollars?” 39. Maya Angelou said “I’ve learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way s/he handles these three things: a rainy day, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights.” Tell a story in which a character has to deal with one, two, or all three of these scenarios. How does your character respond? 40. You have a chance to go back and completely re-do an event in your life. What is it, and how to you change it? What is the outcome? This can be a real or fictional event. 41. Pick two characters from different books you’ve read this year and have them get in an argument about something (e.g., who has suffered more, who has had a happier life, etc.). 42. The one shoe in the road: why is it there? Write a story about the circumstances that led to one shoe in the middle of the road. 43. You get to guest star on a TV show. What show is it? What happens in this particular episode? 44. What would you pack in your suitcase if you could not go home again? 45. You can only use 20 words for the rest of your life. You can repeat them as often as you wish, but you can only use these words. What are they? 46. What current fashion in clothing do you particularly like or dislike? Why? 47. Choose five symbols or objects that represent you. Why did you choose these things? 48. "When I stepped outside, the whole world smelled like…" Write a scene that starts with that line. 49. Write a poem entitled "Hitchhiking on a Saturday Afternoon." 50. Use these two lines of dialogue in a story: "What's in your hand?" "It's mine. I found it." 51. Write a scene that happens in a parking lot between a teenager and a man in a convertible. 52. If you only had one window to look out of for the next six months, what would you want to see on the other side? Describe the view. How would it change? 53. Write a story for children. Start with “Once upon a time” or “Long ago in a land far away.” Include a dragon, a deadly flower, and a mask. 54. "Did she actually just say that?" Write a scene that includes this line. 55. “Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family. Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one.” — Jane Howard. Write what comes to mind when you read this quote. 56. List five things you want in a relationship. 57. List ten favorite lines from movies. 58. Write about the biggest mistake you made this week. Now write about the best thing you did this week. 59. What is the very first memory that you have? Write about it. 60. What if your pet could only talk to you at midnight for an hour? 61. Write an acrostic poem using your full name and three words that describe you—good and bad— for each letter. For example, S: sensitive, stubborn, smiling. A: artistic, argumentative, agoraphobic M: melodramatic, moody, magical 62. What if you could create your own TV show with all your friends and loved ones as the cast? What kind of show would it be and who would play which parts? 63. Take a photo or draw a picture of every place you go in a day. Put the pictures or drawings in your journal. 64. A to Z: Make an alphabetical list of advice for someone who is about to become a teenager. For example: A: ask forgiveness, not permission. B.: bake cookies. C.: cook something delicious once a month. D: don't compare yourself to others. 65. Find 10 quotes about happiness. 66. Write about 5 things you'd rather be doing right now. 67. Write out the lyrics to your favorite song. Find some pictures to illustrate the song. 68. Who do you spend the most time talking to? Siblings, parents, friends? Make a list of who you actually talk to during the day and estimate the amount of time invested in each individual. Does the list reveal your priorities? Is it proportional to what is important to you? Make notes of what you talk about in your daily conversations. 69. Find a quote for each month of the year. 70. Animals can sometimes seem remarkably human. Describe an experience with an animal that acted in a very human way. 71. Imagine you opted to have yourself frozen for 50 years. Describe your first days unfrozen, 50 years in the future. 72. Imagine that you are an astronaut who has been doing research on the moon for three years. You are do to go back to earth in a week when nuclear war breaks out on earth. You watch the earth explode. Then what? 73. Create a menu from a fictitious restaurant. Make sure the restaurant has a theme, such as Classic Books, and the food should all be given appropriate names (e.g., “Mockingbird Pie”). 74. Preconceived notions are often false. Describe a time when you discovered that a preconceived notion of yours (about a person, place, or thing) turned out to be wrong. 75. Create a story using words of one-syllable only, beginning with a phrase such as: “The last time I saw her, she...” “From the back of the truck...” “On the night of the full moon...” “The one thing I know for sure…” 76. Describe a significant person (teacher, neighbor, mentor, coach, parent, sibling, sweetheart) with as many physical details as possible and as many similes as possible. (E.g., “Her hair was as golden as straw.”) 77. Write about your first name—why you were given it, what associations or stories are attached to it, what you think or know it means. Do the same for your last name. What name would you give yourself other than the one you actually have? 78. Parents are our first and most important teachers. Describe a valuable lesson you learned from one of your parents. 79. Imagine a moral dilemma (for example, you see someone shoplift or a friend tells a blatant lie to her parents about where she was last night) and explain what you would do and why you would do it. 80. Review an obituary, birth, or a section from the police record or classified ads section of a local newspaper. Choose one and tell the story behind it. 81. List the most attractive things about your current hometown. Now list the most unattractive things. 82. Come up with a list of nouns and a second list of verbs, all of one syllable each. Describe a scene or situation, using a minimum of ten words from each list. 83. Where is your happy place? Write about it and include a picture or drawing. 84. Create a how-to manual for something you can do well (make a craft, bake cookies, restring a guitar, apply make up, etc.). Describe the process so that someone else could complete the task based on your directions. Use present tense verbs. 85. Free write on this quote by Samuel Johnson: “Ignorance, when voluntary, is criminal.” 86. Find a favorite quote and work it into an illustration. (Inspiration here.) 87. Make a soundtrack for your life so far. List songs that describe you or different times of your life. (Make the actual soundtrack on Spotify, etc. too!) 88. Sometimes we find ourselves in situations that force us to face our deepest fears. Tell about a time when you had to face one of your greatest fears—or make up the story. 89. You’re a talk show host. Pick two guests. Why did you choose them? Are they people who get along, or people with vastly different viewpoints? Write about the episode. 90. What three books do you think should be required reading for everyone? Why? 91. “What you don’t know what hurt you.” Write a story that begins with this statement. 92. Free write on this quote by Woodrow Wilson: “Friendship is the only cement that will hold the world together.” 93. According to a Czechoslovakian proverb, “Better a lie that soothes than a truth that hurts.” Agree or disagree? Explain. 94. Rewrite “The Tale of the Three Little Pigs” by using people that you know as the pigs and the wolf. 95. There is a saying that you should be careful what you wish for, because you just might get it. Describe a time when you wished for something and got it—and then wished you hadn’t—or make up a story in which this happens to the character. 96. As the saying goes, “rules are meant to be broken.” Tell about a time when you broke the rules and what happened as a result. 97. "That's not what I meant!" Write a story that has this line in it somewhere. 98. A blue trash can, a red picture frame, a teddy bear with the stuffing falling out, and a padlock. Put these four items somewhere in a story, scene, or poem. 99. Write your name in outline letters on a whole sheet of paper. Now fill in each letter with words you like that begin with that letter. For example: 100. Make a word collage of who YOU are. Use pictures too, if desired. **HURRAH! You can now purchase this as a digital PDF ($2) at Teachers Pay Teachers. For more creative writing ideas, check out my free WordSmithery creative writing lessons and my popular Ultimate Guide to Creative Writing Resources! Check out 100 other 100 Things posts from the bloggers at iHomeschool Network! Do you have it yet? The Big Book of Homeschooling Ideas—a collaboration of over 50 authors with 103 chapters— is now available! Don't miss this amazing resource!

Middle grade books are admittedly some of my favorites to read. Both when I was in middle school and now as an adult. My only regret is that I hardly read

Looking for a book list for making inferences and predictions? Here you go! Be sure to check out all the book lists I have for teaching comprehension. *This post contains affiliate links. Making inferences and predictions are highly related comprehension strategies. In fact, most books for teaching comprehension lump them together. For the younger ... Read More about Book List for Making Inferences and Predictions

Are you classroom teacher looking for engaging ways to teach your students to comprehend stories? Read this post for primary ideas on how to get children to learn to visualize and build reading comprehension.

Whether you're a homeschool mom looking for a great book for your 5th grader or a classroom teacher trying to build a great library, finding texts that are engaging and a great fit for your readers can be tough. I've compiled this list of the best books for 5th graders to help save you time and give you a

hold students accountable while they independently read with these easy to implement reading tips and tricks and strategies

Need Wonder activities for your classroom or home school Wonder teaching resources? We have Wonder lesson plans, Wonder worksheets, and more ideas for book projects, kindness activities for middle school, and diversity lessons to make a great study unit for students using both the novel by RJ Palacio and teaching with movies (including the popular precepts project!).

Wild Thing Book Activities! This unit is fantastic for Maurice Sendak's book Where the Wild Things Are. Writing worksheet and craft included. Perfect for kindergarten or first grade!

I receive a lot of questions about how I run my literacy block. At my school, our schedule is blocked out, but I have freedom to arrange my own blocks (if that makes sense). So my literacy block is 9:40 – 11:15, and this is what I’ve decided to do with it: We start right ... Read More about My Literacy Block

I love encouraging my students to explore a variety of genres, but sometimes that means I need to explicitly teach them about the genres first! These free genre posters are the perfect way to do just that!

Clever ideas for kids' book reports, from mint tins to cereal boxes to a Wanted poster.

hold students accountable while they independently read with these easy to implement reading tips and tricks and strategies

As summer winds down, I reflect on what I've learned this summer through the workshops I've attended, the books I've read, and all the great conversations I've had with professionals. This quote has had me thinking quite a bit. It comes from Disruptive Thinking: Why How We Read Matters by Kylene Beers and Robert Probst. What they state is absolutely true. Students need to find relevance in what they are doing right now. So let's backtrack a little... I have always been about purpose. I look at what I'm teaching and ensure that what we are doing serves a purpose. And I share that with students. Understanding why we are doing something is very important to me. Interest is also imperative. I have always tried to make sure that I am matching the books I choose to the interest of my students. Interest surveys, conversations, and book selection time have always been informative to me. But relevance. This is something much deeper. It is something you are connected to. It is something that MATTERS. Well...and when I think about it...do I really read anything that isn't relevant to me? Nope. Not really. So what do I do now? I've been thinking a lot about it and my first step is to just ask my first graders. What issues or problems matter to you? So I added it to my interest survey (click to grab for free): From there...I will need to get creative. They are new readers. And some of them may share some big issues and some students may not. But I need to be prepared to help them make connections to what matters to them and the books we are reading. And I am up for the challenge because Beers and Probst state that: "If they are to undertake anything significant in the future, it will be because they have learned the importance of significant work early on in their schooling." This statement says a lot. We need our students out there doing significant work. We need them to have a voice. So we need to help them find that voice...even at a young age. Em

These FREE Printables and Unit Studies for Eric Carle's Books will help you expand on what your kids are learning through these beloved books.

These Wonder character faces are perfect for creative writing, extension activities, or novel study. Characters included: - August - Via - Summer - Miranda Posters with lines and no lines are included. Please leave feedback and enjoy the freebie!

10 significant reasons to read aloud to students on a

I want to try all of these.

Here you will find read alouds for upper elementary students that can be used for a variety of occasions in the classroom+ FREE printables!

I have always assigned nightly reading. Why? I don't assign nightly reading because I want to give students "reading homework." I don't assign nightly reading

Create your own listening center in your classroom with these easy instructions from this kindergarten teacher!

Book club suggestions 2024 Looking for the best book club books for discussion in 2024? Check out these books guaranteed to get your book club talking