Compare and Contrast

Comparing and contrasting activities practice analyzing how objects, ideas, or texts are alike and/or different. For example, comparing and contrasting an event in a biography of a person versus those in the person’s autobiography helps to understand how a person personally views the event as opposed to how that person is viewed by the outside world as an actor in the event.

Telephones Past and Present

There are billions of telephones in the world today. They have been around for a long time. In fact, not a single person on Earth today was alive when the telephone was first invented. The word telephone is even older than the device. It comes from the ancient Greek words…

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Think about a garden. It is filled with plants that have flowers. How did they get there? What makes a flower grow? First, there is a seed. The seed is hard on the outside. That keeps what is inside nice and safe. Inside the seed is a baby plant. There…

Laurie Makes Mischief, and Jo Makes Peace

The four March sisters; Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy; are growing up during the Civil War. They are good friends with their next door neighbors, the wealthy Mr. Laurence and his grandson, called Laurie. In this passage, Laurie has played a mean prank on Meg, and the Marches have found…

The Mock Turtle’s Story

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland was written in 1865. Alice, the main character, explores a very strange land with many odd characters. In this passage, Alice has been take by the Gryphon, or griffin, to meet the Mock Turtle. ———————————— ‘When we were little,’ the Mock Turtle went on at last,…

A Winning Smile

Gina walked slowly toward the school building. Her stomach fluttered with butterflies. Today she was starting school in a new town. Hopefully, she would make some new friends, too. She turned around and waved to her parents, and they gave her a thumbs up; if they only knew how nervous…

Through the Foothills with a Flock of Sheep

In 1869, naturalist John Muir was hired by a California sheep owner to accompany the flock and shepherds to a summer pasture in the Sierra Nevada mountains. Muir recorded his adventure in his diary which was published in 1911. This passage is from the beginning of the trip. —————————————————— June…

Primary Source: Halloween in 1910

This article from the Cleveland, Ohio newspaper reports on Halloween events over 100 years ago. A tick-tack is an instrument used to tap on windows from a distance. The Raisell club’s name is similar in meaning to “raising Cain” or behave in a unruly or disorderly way. ————————————– LAUGHTER REIGNS…

Racing Home

Jill and Ricky lived in a farmhouse near a pond. Each spring, the pond was filled with baby turtles that climbed up onto the rocks to warm themselves in the sun. One spring day, Jill was bored. She wanted to play with the turtles. Suddenly, she had an idea. Jill ran…

Blue Whales: Saving the Giants of the Ocean

Blue whales are the largest animals on Earth. They are also the largest animals known to have ever existed. This means that they are bigger than the dinosaurs that lived millions of years ago. Blue whales weigh as much as 33 elephants (200 tons) and can be up to 100…

Big Dog and Little Dog

Big Dog and Little Dog were best friends. They were both brown and liked to play. Even though they were the same age, Big Dog was very big, and Little Dog was very little. They lived next door to each other. Big Dog lived in a red house, and Little…