The proliferation of deepfakes and visual misinformation coupled with the fast-paced nature of social media has prompted an increased need for media literacy skills among emerging citizens. The unit activity detailed in this article overviews a media literacy framework for engaged citizenship and presents media literacy strategies that emerging…

In this article, the authors share an account of an eighth-grade personal narrative unit designed to support students in composing accounts of life during the 2020-21 pandemic school year. The article provides an overview of the four phases that comprised this nine-lesson unit and the materials and resources used. Students' voices, perspectives,…

A solid understanding of the structure and function of cells can help establish the foundation for learning advanced concepts in the biological sciences. The concept of the cell is introduced in middle school life science courses and is continued at the undergraduate level in college (NRC 2012; Reece et al. 2014). Cells are introduced to students…

This semester-long activity requires students to reflect on their own strengths and weaknesses in attempting to take on a personally meaningful health behavior change challenge. This assignment affords them the opportunity to take a deeper look at theory and health concepts learned throughout the semester and to see how it has informed their own…

Today's society is characterized by a plurality of cultures in such a way that a person will often interact and interrelate with new cultures. The situation becomes even more complicated when one has to adapt to a new culture for a short period of time (travel or study visit) or a long period of time (new work place, emigration etc.). Any…

This study examined computer game development as a pedagogical activity to motivate and engage students in curriculum-related literacy activities. We hypothesized that as a consequence, students would improve their traditional reading and writing skills as well as develop new digital literacy skills. Eighteen classes of grade 4 students were…

Research has shown that video games can be good for learning, particularly for STEM topics. However, in order for games to be scalable and sustainable, associated research must move beyond considerations of efficacy towards theories that account for classroom ecologies of students and teachers. This study asks how a digital game called "Citizen…

In this Voices Inside Schools essay, a veteran teacher shares her reflections on a classroom unit entitled "How Language Reveals Character." The goal of the unit is to help adolescents read and write critically through an exploration of literary characters' language. Beginning by drawing on adolescents' fascination with one another,…

Provides crafts, recipes, games, and songs representative of those which existed during the time of the framing of the United States Constitution. Includes student reading material about the constitution along with a written "comprehension check" exercise. Also provides guidelines for having the students write their own classroom constitution.…

Descriptions of disciplinary practices can suggest visions of authentic classroom activities. Designing activities that are effective, however, requires an additional framework for identifying a discipline's generative resources -- that is, those learning targets that enable students to make disciplinary sense and progress in subsequent…

Serving as a way to sum up or apply many of the principles students have been studying in a general semantics course, a unit on advertising language is devoted to examining how advertisers select language for its affective and directive uses. The unit shows how language is used to stimulate consumer interest in a product and often to mask the lack…

This activity unit provides an example of how the construction and interpretation of graphs can be incorporated into elementary classroom activities. (MP)

A history teacher describes an activity which involved her seventh grade class in researching, learning, and displaying a colonial craft, in order to learn more about life in colonial America. (AEM)

Sixth graders discovered the sociological benefits derived from reading newspapers''; specific activities are listed. (Author/SP)