English Language Arts Grades 7-8 (2023)
Lesson Plans

Speaking and Listening (7-8.SL)

Students will learn to collaborate, express and listen to ideas, integrate and evaluate information from various sources, use media and visual displays as well as language and grammar strategically to help achieve communicative purposes, and adapt to context and task.

Standard 7-8.SL.1:

Participate effectively in a range of conversations and collaborations on topics, texts, and issues.

• A Long Walk To Water Connection Experience
  In this co-taught 80-minute face-to-face lesson (assessment is homework or given time in a second class session) students will rotate through stations to make personal connections with the book, A Long Walk to Water by  Linda Sue Park. (Stations can be removed or customized to allow for time, budget, or supervision constraints.) Please note, this lesson works best when you have several adult volunteers to run stations. This lesson is best co-taught with an ELA teacher who will be reading and discussing the book with their students. (It can be slightly adapted to fit similar stories.) It is also an effective way to deepen understanding and connections after the class has read the book. Thumbnail Image: Woodwayne, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
• American Authors in the Nineteenth Century: Whitman, Dickinson, Longfellow, Stowe, and Poe
  This primary source set includes documents and images from the lives of American authors in the 19th century. A teacher guide is included to assist educators in utilizing the primary sources in their instruction.
• BBC My World Media Literacy
  My World Media Literacy, developed in partnership by BBC Learning, BBC World Services, and Microsoft, is a free educational platform for students ages 11-14 designed with the goal of increasing global media literacy and the evaluation of information presented in modern journalism. Featuring ten 45-minute lesson plans, each with activities and a companion video, these 21st century resources increase students? critical thinking skills needed to be responsible consumers of news while inspiring them to become citizen journalists in order to navigate the news and form their own opinions.
• Book Reports
  This lesson plan meets the secondary requirements for The Engish Language Arts Standard Reading: Literature Grades 7-12 with the option of meeting the additional standard of Speaking and Listening. This lesson offers specific details with flexibility for implementation in the classroom. Students can work independently or in groups and be able to create their final book project using technology. 
• Dr. Cannon Goes to Washington: Utah Statues in National Statuary Hall
  Students will engage with primary source documents to explore the reasons behind memorializing people in public art. Students will craft written or oral statements to support an argument in favor of installing a statue of Dr. Martha Hughes Cannon, Philo T. Farnsworth, or Brigham Young in National Statuary Hall.
• Examining History with Maya Angelou's Poetry
  Well known for addressing social issues in the world through her poetry, Maya Angelou's moving poems serve to teach historical topics in this lesson. To understand the world that surrounded her, students practice their visual literacy skills as they first examine photographs from the Library of Congress. These primary sources illustrate some of the events that affected her life and thus her writing. Next students research these events in order to create trading cards using the ReadWriteThink Trading Card Creator Student Interactive. While reading Angelou's poems, students share the trading cards to better understand the background for her writing.
• Imagery and Strategies Used in the Women's Sufferage Movement: Developing a Get-Out-The-Vote Campaign
  Students will analyze primary source documents from the women?s suffrage movement?both nationally and in Utah?to examine the tactics, strategies, and imagery used in this social movement. They will also evaluate the effectiveness of these tactics and strategies in affecting social and civic change.
• Limiting Child Labor: Providing for the General Welfare
  How does Congress gather information, and how does it use that information to create legislation? How can this research impact the lives of Americans in both the short and long term? How can a bill that has been deemed unconstitutional still inform future legislation?
• Philip Reid and Freedom
  How are concepts, such as freedom, represented in works of art? What do specific works of art or architectural features tell us about what was important to the people who designed or made them, particularly if they are telling a story about the importance of freedom?
• Research and Develop a Topic
  Students learn how to research and develop a topic for a student choice project.
• S is for Shoes Off in the House | ABC's of AAPIs
  This lesson plan encourages classroom discussions and reflections on cultural norms, mores, and folkways and uses the coloring sheet and poem: "S is for Shoes Off in the House" to propel critical thinking about students' own cultures in relation to others and how we can show respect, tolerance, and acceptance.
• Secession and the Senate
  What is secession? How did secession of the southern states from the Union during the Civil War affect the Senate and how did the members respond?
• The Clean Water Act
  How does a bill become a law? What is the role of Congress and the President in this process? How did the Clean Water Act of 1972 become a law?
• The Constitutional Convention: What the Founding Fathers Said
  To what shared principles did the Founding Fathers appeal as they struggled to reach a compromise in the Constitutional Convention? In this lesson, students will learn how the Founding Fathers debated then resolved their differences in the Constitution. Learn through their own words how the Founding Fathers created"a model of cooperative statesmanship and the art of compromise."
• The Federalist Debates: Balancing Power Between State and Federal Governments
  This lesson focuses on the debates among the U.S. Founders surrounding the distribution of power between states and the federal government. Students learn about the pros and cons of state sovereignty vs. federalism and have the opportunity to argue different sides of the issue.
• The Industrial Age in America: Sweatshops, Steel Mills, and Factories
  About a century has passed since the events at the center of this lesson-the Haymarket Affair, the Homestead Strike, and the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire. In this lesson, students use elementary historical sources to explore some of the questions raised by these events, questions that continue to be relevant in debates about American society: Where do we draw the line between acceptable business practices and unacceptable working conditions? Can an industrial-and indeed a post-industrial-economy succeed without taking advantage of those who do the work?
• Voices of American Indian Boarding Schools Audio Museum
  RI.6.6, W.6.1a, W.6.1b, W.6.1e, W.6.4, SL.6.1d, SL.6.4, SL.6.6Voices of Native American Boarding Schools Audio Museum Performance TaskCreate a museum exhibit made up of audio recordings using narratives bystudents of American Indian boarding schools.Steps1. Select a text (a poem, personal narrative, etc.) written by a survivor of the boarding schools.2. Write a preface for the text that introduces it and provides context.3. Write a reflection that explains why the text is meaningful.4. Record yourself reading your preface, text, and reflection aloud using proper and respectful intonation, volume, and pacing.5. Review and re-record your reading, polishing it to perfection!6. Welcome guests to the audio museum! Listen to the recordings of your classmates, and answer questions about three classmates? recordings on a note-catcher.8. Engage in a whole class discussion about the connections between the performance task and the module overall.PurposeThrough our work before and during the audio museum, we can help make sure that these powerful stories about American Indian boarding schools are exposed to a wider audience.
• Write an If-Then Adventure Story
  Student learn to create an if-then adventure story using Google Applied Digital Skills

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http://www.uen.org - in partnership with Utah State Board of Education (USBE) and Utah System of Higher Education (USHE).  Send questions or comments to USBE Specialist - Naomi  Watkins and see the Language Arts - Secondary website. For general questions about Utah's Core Standards contact the Director - Jennifer  Throndsen.

These materials have been produced by and for the teachers of the State of Utah. Copies of these materials may be freely reproduced for teacher and classroom use. When distributing these materials, credit should be given to Utah State Board of Education. These materials may not be published, in whole or part, or in any other format, without the written permission of the Utah State Board of Education, 250 East 500 South, PO Box 144200, Salt Lake City, Utah 84114-4200.