Cluster 1: Conventions of Standard EnglishArchived

Students will begin by discussing the difference between letters, words, and sentences followed by a reading of The Alphabet Tree by Leo Lionni. After partaking in a fun sentence strip activity, students will be asked to practice their star writing skills by writing a sentence about a time that they were happy.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will become story sequencers as they participate in whole group, partner, and independent activities. Students will recall important events from the story The Little Red Hen and help generate a class story to demonstrate their understanding of beginning, middle, and end before completing their summative assessment. At the end of the lesson students will become authors of their own narrative when they write a sequential story of a special event. They will use suggestions and revisions from their peers and teacher to create a final draft of their narrative that will be shared with the class.

Type: Lesson Plan

Students will work in teams to help choose the best Popsicle to sell. They will develop a procedure based on the following criteria: taste, color, cost, and melting speed. They will reassess the Popsicles during the twist incorporating flavors and a fourth Popsicle choice. Students may arrange the criteria based on their team's interpretation of most important to least important. Students may have to make trade offs based on these interpretations.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

This MEA is designed on a Kindergarten grade level. Students will work in teams to determine the best pet toys to buy for a pet daycare. Students will use criteria such as fun, exercise, cost, and durability to make their determinations.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

This MEA is designed on a Kindergarten grade level. Students will work in teams to determine the best unique pizza topping to add to a restaurant menu. Students will use criteria such as taste, cost, and nutrition to make their determinations.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

This MEA is designed on a Kindergarten grade level. Students will work in teams to determine the best piece of playground equipment to add to the city playground. Students will use criteria such as safety, cost, degree of fun, and time to build to make their determinations.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

This MEA is designed at a Kindergarten grade level. Students will work in teams to determine the best apple treat to showcase in a display at a farm stand. Students will use criteria such as smell, taste, and profit to make their determinations.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this open-ended question, students, in teams will make decisions about how to rank new ice cream flavors for Frosty's based on various ice cream characteristics (e.g., taste, smell, color and fun factor). Students will practice analyzing data sets and their writing skills to record their process and thinking.

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this open-ended MEA, students, in teams, will make decisions about how to select a new bicycle for a bicycle company to start selling. Their decisions will be based on various bicycle features (e.g., bell, helmet, customer ratings and color).

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will recall information from a read aloud text and discuss what it means to demonstrate good manners. Activities include contributing to a good manners chart, composing a sentence using a sentence frame demonstrating understanding of the conventions of standard English and practicing spelling words in creative ways. At the end of the lesson, students will create a Good Manners page for a class book, sharing a time when they have shown good manners.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will listen to the teacher read aloud the well-loved book, The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. Students will collaboratively practice retelling the story with a partner and record the food that the caterpillar ate on a class chart. Using their imagination, students will create a sentence and accompanying illustration of what their caterpillar would eat using the high frequency word ‘and’. Teachers are provided with a rubric to assess how the students are using punctuationusing punctuation, capitalization, finger spacing, and phonetic spelling.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson students will participate in reading the books,  A Mink, a Fink, A Skating Rink, To Root, to Toot, to Parachute, and Hairy, Scary, Ordinary and complete a variety of related activities that allow them to learn about and practice their knowledge of nouns, verbs, and adjectives. Students will contribute to a class generated grammar chart and complete a grammar sort. Students will also publish their own sentence which will include a noun, verb, and adjective, as well as an illustration to provide detail.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this lesson, students will serve as researchers of the beloved author, Kevin Henkes. After reading three of Henkes’s most popular books, students will complete a chart of story elements, record their opinion about each book, and create an opinion writing piece to inform others of their favorite Kevin Henkes book and why they like it best.

Type: Lesson Plan

In this open-ended question, students, in teams will make decisions about how to rank shoes based on various shoe characteristics (e.g., color, comfort, shoelaces, lights, and customer ratings).

Model Eliciting Activities, MEAs, are open-ended, interdisciplinary problem-solving activities that are meant to reveal students’ thinking about the concepts embedded in realistic situations. Click here to learn more about MEAs and how they can transform your classroom.

Type: Lesson Plan

Learn to detect words that need capitals with Detectives Sadie, Sam, and Scout in this interactive tutorial. Help fix their secret messages by capitalizing the first word in a sentence, names, the pronoun I, days of the week, and months of the year.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Learn how to capitalize the first word in a sentence with this interactive tutorial. You will also be able to capitalize the pronoun “I” when used in a sentence.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

Learn how to identify special words called prepositions that help you describe where a person or object is located. By the end of this interactive tutorial, you should also be able to use these special words to complete simple sentences.

Type: Original Student Tutorial

In this activity, students will sort verbs related to a picture.

Type: Student Center Activity

In this activity, students will quickly write and name the letters of the alphabet. In an extension activity, students will say the sound for each letter.

Type: Student Center Activity

In this activity, students will make sentences using selected words.

Type: Student Center Activity

This page has many worksheets designed to help teach young ESL students. Some work on general language skills; others reinforce particular elements of grammar.

Type: Worksheet