Determining Mood

Mood in "The Tell-Tale Heart" is so evident thanks to Poe's writing technique. I credit this one selection for providing opportunities to teach so much in such a short time.


O Captain! My Captain!

Definitely a student favorite and one I love to teach. This one page analysis of the poem comes with paraphrase placement and comparisons to be completed. A key is included for convenience.


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Literary Analysis Chart

This is useful reference chart that my students use when writing a literary analysis. It has information about setting, plot, characterization, types of fiction, symbolism, tone, theme, style, point of view, irony and figurative language.


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The Tell-Tale Heart

These questions will guide students through each piece of the classic horror story, "The Tell-Tale Heart". This is just a preview.  The document includes a key and 22 detailed questions.


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The Outsiders Questions

I've used these for several year. The item includes a key and 3 pages of questions, quotation identification, and matching.

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"The Monkey's Paw"

Students place events in sequential order.

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The 8 Parts of Speech

Here's a reference chart I use to help students remember the 8 parts of speech.

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Figurative Language and Quotation association

 S.E. Hinton is known as a character author, but she is also very clearly a descriptive writer as well. Her use of figurative language play, particularly in The Outsiders is quite evident and thankfully so. Where students sometimes struggle with understanding the difference between simile or metaphor, the examples that proliferate the text, make them want to sort out the figurative language type in the activity below. In my classroom, I've also user this activity to team up groups - Socs and Greasers to create a little healthy competition! Students also associate the quote with the speaker in an activity linked below.




The Outsiders

Students love S.E. Hinton's The Outsiders. Every year I have students, parents, staff members and family fondly remember all of the characters and many of their idiosyncrasies. It gives me so much pleasure to revisit this novel every year. I've recently updated many of my files to include Interactive activities compatible with Smart Board. 

Students Sort out character traits from The Outsiders. The slides pair characters such as Ponyboy/Soda, Johnny/Twobit, Darry/Dally. There are 64 characteristics for 8 main characters. The content is largely from the first 4 chapters. In a similar activity, students sort out the named characters with their matching traits. I use this after the first few chapters to introduce the characters and their traits. This item matches up with the following printable item. Students really don’t seem to mind that the activities are similar. They love to show off their knowledge of the characters.




"The Monkey's Paw"

Unfortunately for me, our state adopted text no longer includes W.W. Jacob's short story, "The Monkey's Paw". It's such a great classic horror story that my 8th Grade students loved. Paired with Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart", it was definitely a student favorite. In any case, I hope to teach it again some time and have posted a Interactive Smartboard items that go along with this story.

I always have my students talk about what makes a good story - especially when we read horror stories. What makes a story suspenseful for them? The key elements that the author uses (a mysterious stranger in a dreary setting along with several ignored warnings) make this a perfect story to delve into the author's techniques for creating this classic story.







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Using Animoto

Using Animoto to introduce content in original ways has been something I've tried to practice. When working with students on biographies, I used this video about Oral History to show my students the depth of research.