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Grade 4

TEKS ELA Standard: 4.11.B.ii

developing an engaging idea with relevant details

Chaos Can Be Positive or Negative
Chaos Can Be Positive or Negative
Sometimes we want order, but sometimes we need chaos!
Maze Generator
Maze Generator
Create and print mazes for your students – with bonus side quests!
Power Can Be Fast, Slow, Loud, or Quiet
Power Can Be Fast, Slow, Loud, or Quiet
Power may seem loud and fast, but it can also be slow and quiet.
That Quote’s Not Quite Right: Albert Einstein
That Quote’s Not Quite Right: Albert Einstein
When I see a quote, I often think, “That’s not quite right!”
Two Animals Switch Biomes
Two Animals Switch Biomes
What if a capybara and a kangaroo rat switched homes? Would their adaptations be helpful at all?
Characters’ Faults Can Also Be Strengths
Characters’ Faults Can Also Be Strengths
Strength and weakness are often two sides of the same coin. Students will explore how a character’s flaw can be a benefit.
Holiday Shuffle – Day vs Date
Holiday Shuffle – Day vs Date
Wouldn’t some holidays be better on a certain day of the week? Should Thanksgiving have a set date?
Halloween Problems and Solutions
Halloween Problems and Solutions
When we try to solve a problem, sometimes we end up creating new problems. Which lead to new solutions. Which lead to new problems.
St. Patrick and Other Legends
St. Patrick and Other Legends
How would real people feel about the legends that have been created about them?
Getting Specific With St. Patrick’s Day Writing
Getting Specific With St. Patrick’s Day Writing
Let’s take a starting phrase about St. Patrick’s Day and get specific. No, even more specific!
New Uses For A Cardboard Tube
New Uses For A Cardboard Tube
So, what can a cardboard tube be used for other than holding wrapping paper?
Order, Chaos, and the Holiday Season
Order, Chaos, and the Holiday Season
Let’s write a holiday song about order and chaos!
Holiday Emoji Story ⛷️
Holiday Emoji Story ⛷️
Students will create a story about ⛷️🌨️🌲🐻🤝
Holiday Emoji Story 🍪
Holiday Emoji Story 🍪
Students will create a story about 🍪🥛🔍🐾🦌
Holiday Emoji Story ☃️
Holiday Emoji Story ☃️
Students will create a story about ☃️👑🏔️🔭✨
Holiday Emoji Story 🎅
Holiday Emoji Story 🎅
Students will create a story about 🎅🛷🌀🚀🌍
Holiday Emoji Story 🚚
Holiday Emoji Story 🚚
Students will create a story about 🚚🎁🤔🐶🫣
Halloween Emoji Story 🎃
Halloween Emoji Story 🎃
Students will create a story about 🎃🕯️📖💥👻.
Halloween Emoji Story 🌕
Halloween Emoji Story 🌕
Students will create a story about 🌕🌲👣😱💨.
Halloween Emoji Story 🕷️
Halloween Emoji Story 🕷️
Students will create a story about 🕷️🕸️📩🔑🚪.
Emoji Stories 🦁
Emoji Stories 🦁
Students will create a story about 🦁👑🐗🎶🌄
Emoji Stories 🐌
Emoji Stories 🐌
Students will create a story about 🐌📬✈️🏛️ 📜
Emoji Stories 🚚
Emoji Stories 🚚
Students will create a story about 🚚🤖📻🛸🌌
Emoji Stories 🏟️
Emoji Stories 🏟️
Students will create a story about 🏟️🏹🍞🐦🔥
Emoji Stories 🕰️
Emoji Stories 🕰️
Students will create a story about 🕰️🎩🐀💎🕺
Emoji Stories 👁️
Emoji Stories 👁️
Students will create a story about 👁️🔮🌩️🚷🌲
Emoji Stories 🚗
Emoji Stories 🚗
Students will write a story about 🚗🗺️🌋🐉🌉
Emoji Stories 🤖
Emoji Stories 🤖
Students will create a story about 🤖💃🎵🕺🐔.
Emoji Stories 🐻
Emoji Stories 🐻
Students will create a story about 🐻🎩🎙️🐰🤣.
Emoji Stories 🏰
Emoji Stories 🏰
Students will create a story about 🏰📚🔍🔐🚪.
Emoji Stories 🛥️
Emoji Stories 🛥️
Students will write a story about 🛥️🏊🌊🐙🤝 .
Greekymon Studies – Round 3
Greekymon Studies – Round 3
What might a creature named “Aquacornus Rex” be like?
Greekymon Studies – Round 2
Greekymon Studies – Round 2
What might a creature named “Hypermnemonicus” be like?
Mother’s Day Cards
Mother’s Day Cards
Let’s write the cleverest Mother’s Day cards you’ve ever seen!
Bobbing for Apples
Bobbing for Apples
What is bobbing for apples like… for an apple?
Super Specific Similes – Strong Uncle
Super Specific Similes – Strong Uncle
Let’s make this simile about a strong uncle even more specific.
A Halloween Costume Gone Wrong
A Halloween Costume Gone Wrong
Let’s go roller skating in a Halloween costume! What could possibly go wrong?
Super Specific Similes – Slimy Broccoli
Super Specific Similes – Slimy Broccoli
Students will make this slimy broccoli simile seriously specific.
Super Specific Similes: Quick Baby
Super Specific Similes: Quick Baby
Let’s make this simile about a quick baby even more specific.
Super Specific Similes: Loud Class
Super Specific Similes: Loud Class
Let’s make this simile about a loud class super specific!
Super Specific Similes: Stinky Seaweed
Super Specific Similes: Stinky Seaweed
Students will make this simile about stinky seaweed super specific.
Squiggles Collection 1
Squiggles Collection 1
Students start with the same squiggle and then draw on it, turning it into whatever they think it might be.
What If… Unreliable Water?
What If… Unreliable Water?
What would the consequences be if a town’s tap water became… unreliable?
What If… Long Life?
What If… Long Life?
What would the consequences be if all people lived much, much longer?
What If… No Sleep?
What If… No Sleep?
What would the consequences be if no one had to sleep anymore?
New Uses For A Chair
New Uses For A Chair
So, what can a chair be used for other than, you know, sitting in?
New Uses For An Aluminum Can
New Uses For An Aluminum Can
So, what CAN a CAN be used for other than storing liquids?
Categorize and Re-Categorize Countries
Categorize and Re-Categorize Countries
Put these countries into groups. Then do it again. Then… do it one more time. How does re-re-grouping the same places reveal new patterns and give new insights?
Looking Closely at Holiday Photos
Looking Closely at Holiday Photos
Let’s write from multiple perspectives using an old timey holiday photo!
Thanksgiving Photo Writing
Thanksgiving Photo Writing
Starting with an old-timey photo, students will write from a particular item’s point of view.
Stories with the Same Problems and Solutions
Stories with the Same Problems and Solutions
Have you ever noticed that some stories have awfully similar problems? What if we looked for the most unusual way of solving a repeating problem?
Back to School: Rewriting The Beatles’ “Help!”
Back to School: Rewriting The Beatles’ “Help!”
Can your students come up with a one-syllable word to sum up their time away from school? And then rewrite The Beatles’ song Help!?
Introducing Universal Theme of Systems
Introducing Universal Theme of Systems
So what could you do with a Universal Theme of Systems? Well, here’s an introduction that will get your students’ brains sweating.
Writing in Pilish
Writing in Pilish
Pi can go beyond circles! What if you wrote using the digits of pi as your guide?
New Uses for a Paperclip
New Uses for a Paperclip
So what are some new ways to use a paperclip?
Fancier Figurative Language: Use the Opposite
Fancier Figurative Language: Use the Opposite
Let’s start with “As cold as fire.”
Fancier Figurative Language: Move the Simile
Fancier Figurative Language: Move the Simile
What if we started a sentence with the simile?
Writing About Art: The Scream
Writing About Art: The Scream
Your students will turn the iconic painting The Scream into a vivid, sensory poem.
Cram
Cram
Try this a simple (but surprisingly strategic) grid-filling game!
Inferring With Art: A Man
Inferring With Art: A Man
What’s going on in this painting? Who is that guy? What’s his job? And where’s his other boot?
Writing Technique: Triple Anadiplosis!
Writing Technique: Triple Anadiplosis!
Have students mastered the art of anadiplosis: ending one sentence with the beginning of the next? Now it’s time to take it to the next level!
Writing Technique: Opposite Adjectives
Writing Technique: Opposite Adjectives
A specific technique to help students add some spice to their writing. We’ll be using antonyms to describe the same topic!
Writing A Thanksgiving Letter
Writing A Thanksgiving Letter
What if an inanimate object could express thanks for a special person in your life? What would it write?
Holiday vs Holiday (from a Mascot’s Perspective)
Holiday vs Holiday (from a Mascot’s Perspective)
Want something to do during the holiday season that is both fun and involves thinking? Get students writing about what a snowman would think about Halloween or what a ghost would think about Thanksgiving.
Virtue or Vice?
Virtue or Vice?
Aristotle noted that positive traits and negative traits are often the same thing, but just in different amounts. The right amount is a virtue, but too much or too little and it’s a vice.
SCAMPER: Scaffolding Creativity
SCAMPER: Scaffolding Creativity
Asking students to “think creatively” won’t get you far. They won’t know how to start, they’ll get stuck with simple ideas, or they’ll just go completely wild. SCAMPER is a tool for scaffolding the process of creativity.
Not Like The Others: Planets
Not Like The Others: Planets
Which of these planets is not like others? Well, it sure looks simple at first. But each option could be the one that doesn’t fit in.
The Personalities of Rocks
The Personalities of Rocks
What would an igneous rock be like? Would it get along with a sedimentary rock? Could they handle the hot personality of a metamorphic rock?
Student Introductions with Complexity and Frames
Student Introductions with Complexity and Frames
Students will introduce themselves by showing how they’ve changed over time.
Student Introductions With Depth and Frames
Student Introductions With Depth and Frames
Want to introduce the tools of Depth and Complexity and learn more about your students and introduce the Frame graphic organizer? Have I got the activity for you!
The Resiliency Tournament
The Resiliency Tournament
Your students will set up a tournament to determine which person or character best demonstrated resiliency.
More Specific than “Smart”
More Specific than “Smart”
When students are told that they’re “smart”, what does this word actually mean to them? (Psst. It isn’t what we intended.)
Building Creative Analogies
Building Creative Analogies
We’ll take two seemingly unrelated pieces of content (say volcanoes and the human body) and then build analogies to connect the two ideas. In the end, students can create a skit, comic, or story relating the two concepts.
Showing A Character’s Trait
Showing A Character’s Trait
We tell students to “show, not tell” in their writing, but this advice isn’t effective until they experience the difference. In this video, we’ll put a famous character (of students’ choosing) into a mundane situation and develop a fun scene to show off their main traits.
Using Creativity Tools To Develop A Learning Exploration: Step One
Using Creativity Tools To Develop A Learning Exploration: Step One
Kathryn Haydon begins a series on how to design an independent learning exploration.
Create A Civilization Introduction
Create A Civilization Introduction
Combine social studies, science, and language arts in this year-long creative project!
Educational Valentines
Educational Valentines
Let’s make valentines with an educational twist!
Create A Creature
Create A Creature
Create a new creature based on the adaptations of existing creatures from the same biome.
Greekymon
Greekymon
Rather than just memorizing word parts, students will use those word parts to create four possible products.
Fancier Figurative Language: Start with a Cliche
Fancier Figurative Language: Start with a Cliche
We’ll start with the cliché “as cold as ice” and go somewhere much more interesting.