This is a team-created, standards-based rubric for informative/explanatory analytical writing with "I can" statements as well as space for comments.

This is a team-created, standards-based rubric for narrative writing with "I can" statements as well as space for comments.

After studying utopian literature, students design their own utopian society, publishing the explanation of their ideal world on a blog. As they blog about their utopia, students establish the habits, practices, and organizing social structures that citizens will follow in their utopian societies. They begin by brainstorming ideas about what a perfect society would be like and then, in groups, begin to plan their project. Next, they become familiar with the blogging process, including legal guidelines and the specific site they will be using. Over several class sessions, students work on their blogs comparing their work to a rubric. Finally, after students visit one another's blogs and provide constructive and supportive feedback, they reflect on their own work. The lesson plan includes alternative handouts for classrooms where computer or blog access is limited. In this alternative, students complete the same basic activities, but publish their work using a Flip Book.

In this lesson, students will perform a comparative close reading of select informational texts from the Scottsboro Boys trials alongside sections from To Kill a Mockingbird. Students analyze the two trials and the characters and arguments involved in them to see how fictional “truth” both mirrors and departs from the factual experience that inspired it.

This is an activity to help students create characters for narrative writing or creative writing. Some students struggle to develop a character for a story and therefore creative writing becomes frustrating for them. This is a great way to help students think about their character with more depth.

A template to use to help students develop a flash fiction plot. The plot structure is used as an outline to help keep students on track. This template only works for flash fiction and would need to be modified for narrative writing. You may copy the outline and edit as necessary. 

What is scary, and why does it fascinate us? How do writers and storytellers scare us? This lesson plan invites students to answer these questions by exploring their own scary stories and scary short stories and books. The lesson culminates in a Fright Fair, where students share scary projects that they have created, including posters, multimedia projects, and creative writing.

"The Lady Sings the Blues" is a multi-modal murder mystery project created as a model for use with freshmen in their final writing unit for Honors English.  In a multi-modal writing project, students can incorporate images, sound (music, podcasts, voice-overs), video, animation, clip art, etc. into their writing. Students will create and publish a variety of genres which will each give clues for the reader to discover "who done it."

After reading The Odyssey, students will write their own hero's journey narrative using Joseph Campbell's twelve steps of the hero's journey. Although students may choose to write a story set in Greek mythology, they can choose any setting for their story. Before writing, the students will discuss the hero journey in the Odyssey and popular books and movies. Then they will write their own hero's journey story with an original character and plot. Students will be assessed on development of their introduction, plot, and conclusion as well as character development, setting, and theme (lesson learned.) They will also be assessed on their organization (structure and transitions), style, voice, and mechanics. This unit was created for a classroom of tier two and tier three students who often struggle with organizing their thoughts for writing.

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