The Maze Runner 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 James Dashner's novel. 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.). I define this further in the packet.

The Great Gatsby RAFT Writing Project contains a Common Core-ready writing project for the English/Language Arts or Social Studies classroom.This is a culminating project to end a unit of study on F. Scott Fitzgerald'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.).

Absolute and relative location are two basic, important geography tools that all students must master. Why not teach students these vital skills in a fun, active way? This assignment will do just that! 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). 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 32 NFL football teams using absolute and relative location. January 2023 update: Team names and locations have been updated. Also, it’s easier than ever to take the Google Earth tour of NFL Stadiums. This document describes 5 quick, easy steps to get started. Also, all stadiums and respective cities have been updated since last season. This would be an effective assignment near the beginning of the school year, when students are transitioning into autumn and the NFL season opens its newest season. However, its strength will help reinforce skills later in the school year as well. Included, please find the assignment with a chart for record-keeping, an answer key, a blank USA map, a political USA map, and an idea for an extension assignment. Plus, how about this idea for an educational technology twist? You can visit each and every NFL football stadium using Google Tour Builder! There is nothing to install. Simply, follow the link included in this packet and take your students on a virtual tour today.

Lord of the Flies 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 William Golding'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 Lightning Thief 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 Rick Riordan's fun 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.). I define this further in the packet.

The Martin Luther King, Jr. R.A.F.T. Creative Writing Project is an excellent assignment to use to wrap up a lesson about this iconic figure in American history. It is also a great idea if you wish to make a unit multidisciplinary: you can combine social studies and language arts into a fun, challenging creative writing project! What is a R.A.F.T., you might ask? R.A.F.T. is an acronym for a powerful writing strategy that stands for Role, Audience, Format, and Topic. R.A.F.T.s provide rigor, flexibility, and variety. A R.A.F.T. 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 or types of writing to create one of several products including a letter, a television commercial, a journal entry, and several more.

Would you like to enliven early American history with a fun, challenging writing project? The Salem Witch Trials RAFT Writing Project contains a RAFT writing project for the social studies or Civics classroom. What is a RAFT, you might ask? RAFT is an acronym that stands for Role, Audience, Format, and Topic. It is 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.). I define this further in the packet.

Would you like to enliven ancient history with a fun, challenging writing project? The Gladiators of the Roman Colosseum RAFT Writing Project contains a RAFT writing project for the social studies classroom. This project may be used as a creative research project or as a summarizing assignment to end a unit of study on Caesar or Ancient Rome. **Students are also reminded in the instructions that the writing MUST be school-appropriate! ** 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.).

The Howard Carter and King Tut's Tomb R.A.F.T. Creative Writing Project is an excellent assignment to use to wrap up a lesson about this incredible event in ancient Egyptian history. It is also a great idea if you wish to make a unit multidisciplinary: you can combine social studies and language arts into a fun, challenging creative writing project! It might even complement a thematic learning center! What is a R.A.F.T., you might ask? R.A.F.T. is an acronym for a powerful writing strategy that stands for Role, Audience, Format, and Topic. R.A.F.T.s provide rigor, flexibility, and variety. A R.A.F.T. 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 or types of writing to create one of several products including a letter, a television commercial, a journal entry, and several more.

The Henry Ford and the Model T R.A.F.T. Creative Writing Project is an excellent assignment to use to wrap up a lesson about this iconic figure in American History. It is also a great idea if you wish to make a unit multidisciplinary: you can combine social studies and language arts into a fun, challenging creative writing project! What is a R.A.F.T., you might ask? R.A.F.T. is an acronym for a powerful writing strategy that stands for Role, Audience, Format, and Topic. R.A.F.T.s provide rigor, flexibility, and variety. A R.A.F.T. 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 or types of writing to create one of several products including a letter, a television commercial, a journal entry, and several more. I define this further in the packet.

Would you like to enliven your science lesson with a fun, challenging writing project? The Rainforest Deforestation 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 rainforests. 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.).

This assignment is titled "Let's Explore Canada! Use a Map to Find Canadian Provinces, Territories, Cities, Landforms, and Bodies of Water." This assignment includes 20 questions that require students to analyze a map of Canada for boundaries and borders, major cities, landforms, and bodies of water. Here are two sample questions: "Which river forms part of the border between Ontario and the American state of New York?" and "What is the name of Canada's southernmost province?" I also included two basic mapping assignments: students must label maps of the provinces and territories, and the provincial and territorial capital cities. This would make a great introduction to elementary students preparing to study Canada for the first time. It would also work well in any higher elementary or middle school classroom as map skills are still critical needs in these areas. 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 assignment is titled “Twitter Tales: Writing Haiku, Micropoems, & Short Fiction in 280 Characters or Less.” We hear a lot these days about how our students enjoy communicating with one another using social networking services like Facebook and Twitter. This assignment allows students to write micropoems and short fiction within Twitter’s 280-character limit. This assignment requires critical thinking skills and 21st century technology skills. Students must closely scrutinize appropriate language choices and work within Twitter’s character limit to publish their work. Combining short, creative bursts of writing with this technology has popularized a new trend called Twitterature. Demand has even prompted a magazine called 7x20 where writers can publish their Twitter micropoems. The goal here is to create powerful works of literature in only a few words. What would William Carlos Williams – and other Imagists – think of “Twitterature,” a quirky, new form of micropoetry and flash fiction told in 280 characters or less? This is one of several questions I want students to consider as they strive to create powerful images, emotional pieces, and more works of short literature in this project. Is Twitter blocked at your school? Fear not. I have included some printable worksheets that can be used in the classroom as a “work-around.” The template will not look exactly like Twitter for legal reasons, but it should suffice for this project. Remind students that they still must write within the 280-character limit as one requirement for success on the project.

Students research the origins of the names of five American sports teams -- the Los Angeles Dodgers, the St. Louis Blues, the Seattle Sounders, the Boston Celtics, and the San Francisco 49ers. What is the city's relationship to the American sports team's name? Is it a historical, cultural, or geographical connection? Or a combination of two or three? Students also create their own team for their communities. They must base their team nicknames on a local historical, cultural, or geographical connection.

This assignment introduces students to the six American standard time zones: Eastern, Central, Mountain, Pacific, Alaska, and Hawaii-Aleutian. Students read a short, original non-fiction story about time zones. Next, they answer 15 questions (including two critical thinking questions) about American time zones.

Pirate Pete is back, me hearties! The loveable goofball pirate is rip-roarin' and ready to teach your kiddies about Christmas traditions in different parts of the world. Join the funny pirate in a discussion about Christmas traditions in Finland, Australia, the Bahamas, Germany, and Japan. Plus, ol' Pete introduces students to a wild and wonderful place called Christmas Island, which is located in the Pacific Ocean. This six-page reading assignment also features a guided reading handout and four assignments to keep your students engaged around the holidays! No small feat, right? Preview before you buy!

This activity will provide a good warm-up activity for the beginning of a unit on map skills, an additional practice for quick finishers, and more. Students will create a mental map of their school, their neighborhood, or their home. A mental map is a map you create in your mind of a familiar place. You have been creating these kinds of maps to navigate from place-to-place since you were very young. Think of it like a drawing of a place you carry around in your mind. If you can visualize a place or location in your mind, you have a strong understand of mental mapping skills already. For example, you have a strong map of your school in your mind if you can walk from one part of your neighborhood to another without asking for help. In this activity, you will draw a mental map on a piece of paper. You may draw a mental map of your school, your neighborhood, or your home. The activity comes with a checklist to guide students when they create their maps.

“Macbeth: The Social Network” is an excellent way to bring differentiated instruction to the classroom for a complicated Shakespearean play. We hear a lot these days about how our students enjoy communicating with one another on sites like Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter. This project is essentially a character analysis assignment in the form of a “mock social network.” Students must imagine that characters from Macbeth have social networking pages where they post their thoughts, concerns, activities, motivations, and more. There have been many creative ways to teach Macbeth over the years including mock newspapers, mock trials, and the like. This project puts a 21st-century spin on those assignments and allows students to express themselves in a familiar medium. This packet includes pages for seven characters in Macbeth. Students may role-play as any of them (or all of them) and write “status updates” as if they were the characters. They must write updates in a way that imaginatively demonstrates their knowledge of the character. Ideas for doing so might include interpreting the character’s motivations, justifying his/her actions, inventing private thoughts, and more. The idea however must apply to all: we must find this character’s social networking profile “believable”; the student must stay within character to prove their knowledge of the play. For example, a student might role-play as Macduff and post thoughts that reflect his impulsiveness, while a student role-playing as Lady Macbeth might make comments reflecting her constantly twisting mindscape. A student might take artistic liberty to imagine Malcolm’s thoughts on being king, while another student might get really wild and explore what it’s like to run a joint social media account as the three witches. (That one will be wild, right?) Consider purchasing the assignment today!

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 50-page visual dictionary/workbook assignment gives students an opportunity to learn up to 50 landforms and bodies of water in a fun, completely visual way. Give your students the 21st geography skills they will need in an increasingly "globalized" world. Students must define each geography term, list examples, and then provide a photograph for each. The nice aspect about this assignment is that it is fully customizable to your students' abilities and needs. You may not need all 50 pages, but you can always mix-and-match to fit your curriculum. Let's imagine you are introducing landforms and bodies of water to elementary school students: you might choose ten basic terms from this workbook to teach.