FreeReading is an open source instructional program that helps educators teach early literacy. Because it is open source, it represents the collective wisdom of a wide community of teachers and researchers. FreeReading contains Reading Connect Text Activities, a page of sequential and supplemental activities that helps teachers teach students to decode their first sentences in print.

This media literacy unit was designed and piloted with junior English classes at the start of the school year. Activities can easily be adapted to suit secondary students at various levels. Within the unit, students analyze corporate logos, corporate advertising, movie trailers and stereotypes found in media related to Native American culture. Within the unit, students also learn how to consider the ways in which media appeals to ethos, pathos and logos and how to identify the tone of a piece of media.

In Unit 2, students move from analyzing challenges others face in accessing schools to more specifically analyzing challenges others face in accessing books. Students closely read excerpts from My Librarian Is a Camel by Margriet Ruurs, which describes ways people living in different countries around the world access books. For a mid-unit assessment, students demonstrate their reading skills by reading a new excerpt from this book and determining its main idea.
In the second half of the unit, students switch gears to begin writing informative texts. Using what they have learned about reading informational texts in the first half of the unit, they plan, write, revise, and edit an informative paragraph describing how people in a particular country overcome the challenge of access to books. For the End of Unit 2 Assessment, students write a new informative paragraph describing the challenge and how it was overcome, using evidence from the excerpt from My Librarian Is a Camel read for the mid-unit assessment.

This unit challenges students to view history with a critical lens, and to notice how there is always more than one side to a story. The unit begins with the Mayflower and helps students develop an understanding of why so many colonists decided to leave England and travel to the New World. Students will explore the hardships faced by the colonists, both on the ship and once they arrive in the New World, and how the colonists persevered and relied on the geography and environment to meet their needs. Students will then learn about the Wampanoag, the people who were on the land before the Pilgrims arrived. They will learn about what the Wampanoag valued, how they viewed the Pilgrims, and how the arrival of explorers and settlers negatively influenced their tribe. Then students will be pushed to analyze what really happened at the first Thanksgiving, and whose story is being told. Students will realize that the traditional story of the first Thanksgiving contains many myths that don't accurately reflect the Wampanoag and what really happened in 1621.

This 14 day Unit Plan integrates the Utah Core Standards for Language Arts and for Reading and Writing in History/Social Studies with the existing Utah Social Studies Standards. The students read, research, draw conclusions, and write beginning level argumentative essays comparing/contrasting major world religions. For a more thorough summary see the Background For Teachers section.

In this unit, students will participate in a mock trial that explores the rights and restrictions on individuals attempting to practice their own religion. Students will first familiarize themselves with the Religious Freedom and Restoration Act (“RFRA”), which was intended to further protect First Amendment rights. Students will then read and analyze case documents adapted from a real federal court case, Singh v. Carter, which involved a conflict between a soldier’s desire to exercise his religious practices and the U.S. Army’s interest in protecting its soldiers through uniform and safety requirements.

After learning about the relevant law and facts, students will participate in a mock trial that will allow them to use their knowledge to persuade judges to find either that the soldier’s religious practice is protected by RFRA, or that the Army has an overriding safety concern that forbids the soldier from exercising his religion. The mock trial allows students to assume roles as members of the plaintiff’s team, members of the defendant’s team, neutral judges, or impartial courtroom participants. This allows every student to have a substantive role in deciding or observing a dispute that remains pertinent today. Students engage in the authentic tasks of examining and weighing evidence, and using facts and evidence to formulate and present claims.

This Unit contains 7 lessons:
Lesson 1: Religious Freedom Mock Trial
Lesson 2: Articulating and Applying the Law
Lesson 3: Understanding the Evidence
Lesson 4: Developing a Theory of the Case
Lesson 5: Preparing for Trial
Lesson 6: The Trial
Lesson 7: Debrief and Reflection

Educators worked with coaches to create Remote Learning Plans as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.The attached Remote Learning Plan is designed for Grade 6 Reading students. Students will read a text to determine the author’s purpose and describe how the author’s perspective influences the text. This Remote Learning Plan addresses the following NDE Standard: LA 6.1.6.a It is expected that this Remote Learning Plan will take students 45 to complete. Here is the direct link to the Google Doc: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1lpt7gJMrlenhLV8eC2E486zlJ7Dv5qI8/view?usp=sharing

Students will summarize, analyze, and synthesize the connection between main ideas of two informational texts. Students will analyze the social, historical, cultural, and biographical influences in informational texts. 
 Here is the direct link to the Google Doc: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ekYpo8pbtwoRwl90uBSkI9lvmrLsA2UQ/view?usp=sharing

In this unit, students begin to explore the complexity of immigration and immigrant rights by reading the core text Return to Sender. Through the eyes of two children, Return to Sender highlights the challenges of life for Mexican laborers in Vermont and the way in which stereotypes about undocumented workers are formed. Through the eyes of Tyler, the farm owner’s son, students witness the internal struggle surrounding what makes something right or wrong, particularly in regard to if the family should hire undocumented workers even though without them the beloved family farm would need to be sold. They also see how the stereotypes Tyler believes about Mexican workers are broken down through his relationships with the Cruz family. Through the eyes of Mari, the daughter of an undocumented worker, students witness the daily challenges and barriers undocumented workers face in the fight for a better life and future. As Tyler and Mari develop a friendship, readers are pushed to think critically about the arguments on both sides of the debate surrounding Mexican and other laborers in Vermont, and the way in which friendships across lines of diffference can help dismantle stereotypes.

It is important to note that the scope of this unit is intentionally narrow. Immigration, particularly undocumented immigration, is an incredibly complex issue. This unit serves as an entry point. It is our hope that this unit begins to humanize a controversial topic and inspires students to question things beyond their own world and fight for their own view of what is right. To build a deeper understanding of the nuances and history of migrant workers in the United States, we recommend that this unit is paired with the social studies unit on Cesar Chavez and the migrant workers’ fight for justice and equity.

The SOLID Start project (Science, Oral Language, and Literacy Development from the Start of School) develops professional development opportunities for K-2 teachers that integrates science and literacy. The project also develops standards-based, integrated science and disciplinary language and literacy curriculum materials designed for K-2 children.
***MUST CREATE A FREE ACCOUNT TO USE MATERIALS.***

For teachers in K-Grade 5 classrooms, the author of this article reviews the reading comprehension strategies known as Summarizing and Synthesizing. She provides links to web sites and to a book that will provide more background information and lessons. The article appears in the free, online magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle, which focuses on the seven essential principles of climate science.

This book list contains children's books that have been screened for accuracy in depicting scientific concepts. Each book's content is briefly described and its cover pictured. The topics of the books support learning in Grades K-5 about the issue's theme. The list appears in the free, online magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle, which focuses on the essential principles of climate literacy.

Stories and poems that have a familiar structure can create a supportive context for learning about the writing process, building students' background knowledge, and scaffolding their creation of original stories. In this lesson for students in second or late first grade, teachers help students explore the concepts of beginning, middle, and ending by reading a variety of stories and charting the events on storyboards. As they retell the stories, students are encouraged to make use of sequencing words (first, so, then, next, after that, finally). A read-aloud of Once Upon a Golden Apple by Jean Little and Maggie De Vries introduces a discussion of the choices made by an author in constructing a plot. Starting with prewriting questions and a storyboard, students construct original stories, progressing from shared writing to guided writing; independent writing is also encouraged.

This site contains curated resources related to teaching digital literacy and digital fluency.

In this science-based unit, students begin to build respect for and understanding of living things by studying the life cycles of different plants and animals. In the first bend of the unit, students continue their exploration of seasons by exploring what makes spring the season of growth and the different characteristics of living, nonliving, and dead things. In the second part of the unit, students observe and learn about plants and what seeds need in order to grow into a plant. In the third part of the unit, students observe and learn about frogs and butterflies and the process in which tadpoles turn into frogs and caterpillars transform into butterflies. In the fourth part of the unit, students learn about birds and how birds grow and change inside of an egg. The unit culminates with students studying different ways humans change the environment and coming up with solutions for ways to reduce human impact on the environment. For each bend of the unit it is incredibly important that students are able to participate in hands-on labs and activities that help them see and observe the life cycles in action. Therefore, there are multiple project days within the unit. After the projects and labs have been set up, students should be pushed to predict, observe, record, and explain the changes that they notice. Throughout the unit, students should be challenged to think critically about how the life cycles of plants and animals are similar and different, and what all living things need in order to thrive and survive.

In reading, this unit serves as a chance to review all previously taught reading strategies. With that said, one main focus of the unit is on describing the connection between ideas or pieces of information, particularly in regard to sequencing. Another focus is on describing the relationship between illustrations and the text in which they appear, and using the illustrations to deepen understanding of key details in a text. When the text demands, students should also be challenged to ask and answer questions about key details, identify the main topic, ask and answer questions about unknown words, identify the reasons an author gives to support points in a text, and compare two texts on the same topic. If there are other strategies from the year that students are struggling with, plan strategic places over the course of the unit to spiral in and remediate the strategies so that students are prepared for first grade.

In writing, the main focus of this unit is on ensuring that all students are scoring a 3 or a 4 on the reading response rubric. Therefore, targeted whole-group and small-group mini-lessons should be planned based on student needs.

This list of children's books recommends nonfiction titles that supplement basic information found in lessons and activities of this themed issue of the online magazine Beyond Weather and the Water Cycle. The books are grouped by topic -- water, weather and climate, and atmosphere. Each book is described by its content, reading level, and possible uses in the classroom. Covers are pictured. The online magazine is produced for elementary school teachers and is structured around the essential principles of climate sciences and climate literacy.

In this unit, students build a deeper understanding, appreciation, and respect for the wide variety of religions found in the world by reading two core texts: What Is Religion? and One World, Many Religions: The Ways We Worship. In today’s society, illiteracy regarding religion is widespread and fuels prejudice and bullying. The negative impacts of religious illiteracy and intolerance can be minimized by teaching religion in a non-devotional, academic perspective. Therefore, this unit challenges students to build a broader awareness and understanding of religion by exposing students to a diversity of religious views and educating students about some of the most common religions. It is important to note that this unit is not intended to promote the acceptance of one particular religion or serve as a place to practice religion. Instead, it is our goal that this unit will help students better understand the differences and similarities among the religions and cultures of their classmates, and begin to appreciate and respect differences in religion.

As readers, this unit challenges students to synthesize information across two texts to build a deeper understanding of a topic. Students will analyze how authors support points, what structures they include to emphasize key ideas, and how different texts provide different perspectives and information about similar topics.

In this unit, students explore the relationship between living things and their environment and how the environment can both positively and negatively impact a species’ ability to survive. Using the Next Generation Science Standards as a guide, students will learn about different species, what they need for survival, their life cycle, and how they have adapted for survival. Then students will be challenged to create arguments that explain why some organisms are able to survive well, some survive less well, and others can’t survive at all in certain habitats. Through this unit, along with others in the sequence, students will use the scientific information they learn to think critically about the world around them.

The Science of Living Things texts were chosen as mentor texts for this unit because the author, Bobbie Kalman, uses text features and clear language to clearly communicate complex concepts about the animal kingdom, life cycles, and animal adaptations. As readers, students will be challenged to constantly ask and answer questions about key details in the text, explicitly referring to the text to support an answer or a question. Over the course of the unit, students will also deepen their understanding of how Bobbie Kalman uses text features to not only organize information, but to help a reader learn new information and facts about a subject. Students will also work on using context clues to figure out the meaning of genre-specific vocabulary, find the main idea of a section, and explain cause and effect in relation to scientific concepts.

Explain how writers use figurative language and structural choices to develop and support key ideas.

Explain how Smith uses figurative language in his TED Talk to develop and support his central idea.