This is a research project about ancient Egyptian pharaohs that requires students to role-play as Egyptologists-in-training. Students may choose one of these eight pharaohs: Akhenaten, Cleopatra, Hatshepsut, Khufu, Ramesses II, Seti I, Tutankhamen, or Thutmose III. Their task is to evaluate their chosen pharaoh’s strengths and weaknesses as a leader and their contributions to Egyptian life and culture. Here are some of the specifics: For students: the role-playing letter introduction, step-by-step directions for implementation (written in plain English for students to easily understand), research logs, and a works cited page to document their sources. For teachers: a list of required materials, a pacing guide, two rubrics, and a list of reputable online resources for students to use when they conduct their research. This project is intended as a cumulative assignment to enrich a unit on Ancient Egypt.

The following 25 prompts worked wonderfully in my language arts classes. These prompts will provide narrative and descriptive writing opportunities. For instance, there is a prompt in this packet that requires students to think about a typical Saturday and recount sequential events descriptively. Another prompt will require students to describe a perfect lunch, which will require them to think critically and logically in a creative passage. There are several possibilities here, but the real bonus is the full-color image that accompanies each question to inspire deeper thinking and colourful language choices. I have alternated prompts in this packet to allow for daily or weekly instruction possibilities. Thus, each narrative prompt is followed by a descriptive writing prompt. Why? In my classroom, I passed this assignment out as a classroom packet and one that we would use throughout the school year so students could track progress and see how they had developed as writers from the first day to the last. Please let me know how you use these prompts in your classroom.

This assignment is titled “A Midsummer Night’s Dream: The Social Network,” an excellent form of differentiated instruction to teach one of Shakespeare’s most famous comedies. We hear a lot these days about how our students enjoy communicating with one another on sites like Facebook, Foursquare, Tumblr, and Twitter. This assignment is essentially a character analysis assignment in the form of a “mock social network.” Students must imagine that characters from A Midsummer Night’s Dream have social networking pages where they post their thoughts, concerns, activities, motivations, and more. There have been many creative ways to teach A Midsummer Night’s Dream over the years including mock newspapers, mock trials, and the like. This particular project puts a 21st century spin on those assignments and allows students to express themselves in a familiar medium.

Would you like a fun, challenging way to teach students the fifty states and capital cities? This set of 25 FULL-COLOR Bingo game sheets will do just that! This packet contains a few components to help you and your students practice memorizing states and/or state capitals. You will find the following items: 1. Clue sheets for both states and state capitals; 2. Twenty (20) full-color Bingo sheets containing state outlines; 3. A full-color map labelled with both states and state capitals. What you will need: markers, coloring pencils, or regular pencils for students to mark the Bingo boxes I have used this packet primarily with middle school 6th grade students, but I believe it can be modified to work with upper elementary school students, too.

A Christmas Carol RAFT Writing Project contains a writing project for the English/Language Arts classroom.This is a culminating project to end a unit of study on Charles Dickens’s famous novel. What is a RAFT, you might ask? RAFT is an acronym for a powerful writing strategy that provides rigor, flexibility, and variety. RAFT stands for Role, Audience, Format, and Topic. A RAFT can be implemented in all content areas, thus making it an excellent Writing Across the Curriculum resource. Young writers might pursue one of several genres of writing (expository, narrative, descriptive, argumentative or persuasive) to create one of several products (letter, television commercial, diary entry, etc.).

The following 25 prompts worked wonderfully in my language arts classes. These prompts will provide narrative and descriptive writing opportunities. For instance, there is a prompt in this packet that requires students to think about a typical Saturday and recount sequential events descriptively. Another prompt will require students to describe a perfect lunch, which will require them to think critically and logically in a creative passage. There are several possibilities here, but the real bonus is the full-color image that accompanies each question to inspire deeper thinking and colourful language choices. I have alternated prompts in this packet to allow for daily or weekly instruction possibilities. Thus, each narrative prompt is followed by a descriptive writing prompt. Why? In my classroom, I passed this assignment out as a classroom packet and one that we would use throughout the school year so students could track progress and see how they had developed as writers from the first day to the last. Please let me know how you use these prompts in your classroom.

This packet features a set of 100 short writing prompts or what I like to call “daily warm-ups.” I have used these prompts successfully in a few different scenarios including bell ringer assignments, icebreakers at the beginning of the school year, and in long-term writing projects such as writing folders and portfolios. There are two main parts of this packet: (1) a four-page list of all 100 prompts which might be used as part of a writing folder assignment and (2) a set of task cards that can be easily printed, cut, and shared with students.

Absolute and relative location are two basic, important geography tools that all students must master. While there are many available assignments to teach these concepts to elementary school and middle school/junior high school students, here’s one with a twist! Students will locate all 30 NBA teams using absolute and relative location. Absolute location, of course, requires students to use latitude and longitude to give their answers. Relative location requires cardinal directions (north, south, east, west) and intermediate directions (northeast, northwest, southeast, southwest). This would be an effective assignment as the NBA season opens its latest season. Included, please find the assignment with chart for record-keeping, an answer key, a blank map, a political USA/Canada map, and an idea for an extension assignment. Plus, how about this idea for an educational technology twist? I used Google Earth and a custom-made kml file to bring the stadium tour to life in your classroom. I have included simple instructions to install the file on your laptop or desktop computer.

Absolute and relative location are two basic, important geography tools that all students must master. While there are many available assignments to teach these concepts to elementary school and middle school/junior high school students, here’s one with a twist! Students will locate all 30 MLB teams using absolute and relative location. Absolute location, of course, requires students to use latitude and longitude to give their answers. Relative location requires cardinal directions (north, south, east, west) and intermediate directions (northeast, northwest, southeast, southwest). This would be an effective assignment as the Major League Baseball season opens its latest season. Included, please find the assignment with chart for record-keeping, an answer key, and an idea for an extension assignment. Plus, how about this idea for an educational technology twist? I used Google Earth and a custom-made kml file to bring the stadium tour to life in your classroom. I have included simple instructions to install the file on your laptop or desktop computer. Find the link inside this packet. This tour allows students to utilize modern technology in the classroom to better understand the locations of baseball facilities while also observing diverse environments and city structures from the air. There are several other real world benefits and I hope you will share them with your students!

A Separate Peace RAFT Writing Project contains a Common Core-ready writing project for the English/Language Arts classroom.This is a culminating project to end a unit of study on John Knowles’s famous novel. What is a RAFT, you might ask? RAFT is an acronym for a powerful writing strategy that provides rigor, flexibility, and variety. RAFT stands for Role, Audience, Format, and Topic. A RAFT can be implemented in all content areas, thus making it an excellent Writing Across the Curriculum resource. Young writers might pursue one of several genres of writing (expository, narrative, descriptive, argumentative or persuasive) to create one of several products (letter, television commercial, diary entry, etc.).

Would you like to enliven ancient history with a fun, challenging writing project? Maybe breathe new life into a science or geography lesson about volcanoes? The Pompeii and Mount Vesuvius RAFT Writing Project contains a RAFT writing project for the social studies or science classroom. This project may be used as a creative research project or as a summarizing assignment to end a unit of study on the destruction of Pompeii, the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, or Ancient Rome. What is a RAFT, you might ask? RAFT is an acronym for a powerful writing strategy that provides rigor, flexibility, and variety. A RAFT can be implemented in all content areas, thus making it an excellent Writing Across the Curriculum resource. Young writers might pursue one of several genres of writing (expository, narrative, descriptive, argumentative or persuasive) to create one of several products (letter, television commercial, diary entry, etc.).

This assignment is titled "Let's Explore Mexico! Use a Map to Find Cities, Landforms, States, Bodies of Water and More." This assignment includes 20 questions that require students to analyze a map of Mexico for boundaries and borders, major cities, landforms, and bodies of water. This would make a great introduction to middle school students preparing to study Mexico for the first time in either a World Languages class or a geography class. You might even consider it a "substitute assignment" and leave it for a substitute teacher on a day you are away from the classroom. This assignment works well as an individual assignment or as a partner assignment.

This is a challenging set of 25 research questions for a 20th Century American History class studying the decade 1940-1949. It has a strong focus on events during and after World War II. The questions are organized chronologically, and there are two questions per year in most cases. Here is what is GREAT about this assignment: it's fully customizable! For instance, you might use only 10 of these questions instead of the 25 in the packet. You might choose 5 of the questions and ask students to conduct in-depth research for a full-length report. The possibilities are endless! I decided to make a research assignment that went beyond basic questions like "When did World War II begin?" and "Who was president during World War II?" Instead, I opted for questions that required strong critical thinking skills and better research skills and - above all - taught an appreciation for 20th Century American history.

Consider purchasing this bundle of four 25-question assignments that you can use as a set of daily activities, a set of bell ringer assignments, or as a single research assignment. There are 100 questions to use in your classroom. All answers are included. You will find short research questions related to Ancient History, American History, World History, World Geography, Economics, Government, and more! It is NEVER too early to teach students how to conduct research. This is one of the fundamental skills required of 21st century learners in higher education. I have used these assignments in my classroom, and I have found that my middle school students enjoy them. You might also try to use them in higher level elementary classrooms (5th and 6th grades). Please find each 25-question assignment and an answer key for easy grading in this packet. There are four documents total.

Consider purchasing this quick vocabulary assignment to introduce your elementary or middle school students to some basic geography terminology about landforms and bodies of water. You might even use it as a vocabulary quiz. The choice is yours! I believe this assignment would be best for kids between the ages of 10-14. There are twenty terms found in the complete assignment, with kid-friendly definitions, and an answer key for quick, simple grading. The assignment includes all five themes of geography (location, place, human-environment interaction, movement, and regions) and major lines of latitude and longitude (Antarctic Circle, Arctic Circle, Equator, Tropic of Cancer, Tropic of Capricorn, Prime Meridian). Additional vocabulary terms include: Absolute Location, Degree, Grid, Hemisphere, Latitude, Longitude, Meridian, Parallel, and Relative Location.

This is a challenging set of 20 research questions for a 20th Century American History class studying the decade 1930-1939. The questions are organized chronologically, and there are two questions per year in most cases. Here is what is GREAT about this assignment: it's fully customizable! For instance, you might use only 10 of these questions instead of the 20 in the packet. You might choose 5 of the questions and ask students to conduct in-depth research for a full-length report. The possibilities are endless! I decided to make a research assignment that went beyond basic questions like "When did Amelia Earhart make her famous flight?" and "Who was president during World War II?" Instead, I opted for questions that required strong critical thinking skills and better research skills and - above all - taught an appreciation for 20th Century American history.

This is a collaborative research project about Canada's geography that requires students to role-play as product designers for a fictitious travel association, Travel Canada. An excellent example of differentiated instruction, students may research any of Canada's provinces or territories to find information that makes their chosen place unique: major landmarks, landforms, major and minor cities, symbols, fun facts, etc. Working with partners, the team members will then choose one of five products in this assignment to show what they have learned: a PowerPoint presentation, a three-fold travel brochure, a mobile, a game or game board, or a map on poster board. To meet Writing Across the Curriculum goals, a two-page report on what they learned in the project is also required.

This is a challenging set of 20 research questions for a 20th Century American History class studying the decade 1910-1919. The questions are organized chronologically, and there are two questions per year in most cases. Here is what is GREAT about this assignment: it's fully customizable! For instance, you might use only 10 of these questions instead of the 20 in the packet. You might choose 5 of the questions and ask students to conduct in-depth research for a full-length report. The possibilities are endless! I decided to make a research assignment that went beyond basic questions like "When did the Titanic sink?" and "Who was president during World War I?" Instead, I opted for questions that required strong critical thinking skills and better research skills and - above all - taught an appreciation for 20th Century American history.

This is a challenging set of 20 research questions for a 20th Century American History class studying the decade 1900-1909. The questions are organized chronologically, and there are two questions per year in most cases. Here is what is GREAT about this assignment: it's fully customizable! For instance, you might use only 10 of these questions instead of the 20 in the packet. You might choose 5 of the questions and ask students to conduct in-depth research for a full-length report. The possibilities are endless! I decided to make a research assignment that went beyond basic questions like "Which president was assassinated in 1901?" and "Which city did the Hurricane of 1900 destroy?" Instead, I opted for questions that required strong critical thinking skills and better research skills and - above all - taught an appreciation for 20th Century American history.

This is a challenging set of 21 research questions for a 20th Century American History class studying the decade 1950-1959. It has a strong focus on events during the Cold War and the American Civil Rights Movement. The questions are organized chronologically. Here is what is GREAT about this assignment: it's fully customizable! For instance, you might use only 10 of these questions instead of the 21 in the packet. You might choose 5 of the questions and ask students to conduct in-depth research for a full-length report. The possibilities are endless! I decided to make a research assignment that required strong critical thinking skills and better research skills and - above all - taught an appreciation for 20th Century American history.