This project-based case study of the water crisis in Toledo, Ohio, allows 8th grade students to use a scientific approach to research and writing. Students work in groups after an introduction that includes a flipped classroom study for students (and families) willing to participate. Students will have a better understanding of crisis management/mismanagement and the importance of planning, anticipating problems, and taking proactive measures when there are potential threats.

This lesson on black holes is aligned with ELA standards in regards to reading, researching, and writing about science. Independent learners will research information about black holes and discuss their findings with peers. There are online tests, Kahoot and Socrative, a student-produced podcast, and a number of videos and online reading assignments that offer opportunities to engage independent learners in using technology throughout the leason. While this is an ELA lesson, students with scientific minds and/or interests will be motivated to investigate the scientific information provided in the lesson. This lesson may be completed in a day by highly intelligent students if a flipped classroom component is included. However, average students may need up to a week to complete all tasks. Discussion groups should be formed and guided by students with teacher support. Parts of the lesson can be used to teach an entire class with independent learners acting as group leaders and mentors to other students. Collaborative learning and Vygotsky's. Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) are the learning teaching upon which strategies in this lesson - cooperative learning, nonlinguistic representations, and technology-based learning.

Quizlet provides practice for learning or practicing skills. This Quizlet written for middle school students provides both learning and practice in defining literary terms and testing understanding of those terms in alignment with CCSS. Combined with activities using familiar stories as examples, this lesson provides numerous technology-based learning assessment that scaffolds learning and understanding literary terms through a variety of methods. Collaborative learning and Vygotsky's Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) also make learning cooperative and engages students in uses of a variety of instructional strategies that are in engaging and theoretically proven.

Wikipedia, while not suited for scholarly research, is considered appropriate for basic basic informational research by many educators. This online site is easily accessed by students and its interactive component that allows users to edit content provides students with possibly their first opportunities to contribute to a widely used source in a more educative and intellectual manner than posting on social media. This lesson's standards-based goal is to engage eighth grade students in determining research reliability based information published and sources used by Wikipedia. Another major part of the lesson is to develop a question that drives the research with a strong emphasis on using digital sources and tools. When students complete this lesson, which introduces research with a focus on credibility of sources, they will be prepared to start learning how to conduct more in-depth research. A follow-up project also encourages students with exceptional writing skills to become Wikipedia editors, either contributing research to the site or looking for and correcting inaccuracies.

This CCSS-based 8th grade lesson, which can be done in two lessons plus flipped classroom practice, helps to reinforce and remediate instruction in punctuation and capitalization with fun technology-based group and pair activities.

The goal of this lesson plan for Christian Schools is for students at all grade levels, 1-12, understand how Biblical figures inspire creation of fictional characters and how these archetypes are depicted in literature. Younger children learn the similarities and differences in the stories of Jesus and Superman. Then students in upper elementary grades learn to identify literary techniques and allusions to characters in a book or movie. Students in middle and high school use these resources to identify archetypes in books and movies about heroic characters.

Students in eighth grade are facing the end of middle or junior high school and in the not-so-distant future the start of high school. Between then and now they have a great deal of academics to learn, state tests to pass, and the pressures of being adolescents. So why not start the year celebrating their final year in middle or junior high school in classic Hollywood fashion? This first week of 8th grade ELA unit does just that! Show your students just how special they are while assessing basic language and writing skills. Roll out the red carpet, notify the paparazzi, and let your students have a great time watching movie trailers, writing reviews, looking back at summer, and getting the star treatment; while introducing collaborative learning and project-based activities. Start the school year with high expectations and watch your students soar.

The second half of this standards-based unit involves reading classic novels, "BookCircles" for discussion and presentation, book-to-movie critiques and personalized "locker book spine" displays. Using a variety of tech tools students will learn about figurative language and connotations, and story structure, among other literary devices using familiar stories and fables. Short videos and group discussion provide a less formidable introducion to these concepts and give eighth grade students a foundation on which to build their interest in classical literature.

Using classic fables and fairy tales to analyze themes that are easily identified, this two-part lesson prepares 8th grade Language Arts Students to read and analyze themes in classic children's literature.

Students will trace history of papier mâché after being introduced to the subject with a video of an art installation of 1,600 papier mâché pandas. Students will develop an understanding and respect for the art form resulting in them creating their own Papier Mâché exhibit. This is a technology-based instructional strategy using cooperative learning and inquiry to engage students in research, analysis, and discussion.