Mentor Texts, Poetry & Short Stories
Argumentative & Persuasive
- Recess Makes Kids Smarter by Caralee Adams
- Myth of the Normal Brain: Embracing Neurodiversity by Thomas Armstrong
- Better With Age by Chris B. Brown (article)
- 401 Prompts Argumentative Writing by Michael Gonchar for NY Times
- Is There Too Much Cursing These Days_ - The New York Times
- Should All Middle Schools Teach Algebra_ - The New York Times
- Should Grades Be Based on Excellence or Effort_ - The New York Times
- Should People Take the Opinions of Kids and Teens Seriously_ - The New York Times
- Students Who Lose Recess Are the Ones Who Need It Most - The New York Times
- Should We Abolish the Penny_ - The New York Times
- Kids Who Dont Drink Water Consume More Sweetened Beverages - Smithsonian Mag
- The Argument Scavenger Hunt – TWO WRITING TEACHERS
- Later School Start Times More Popular, But ... by Tim Walker
- Schools shift as evidence mounts that later start times improve teens’ learning by Kirsten Weir
- The Crucial Role of Recess by Leah Whigham
Fiction
- The Fir Tree by Hans Christian Andersen
- The Stone Boy by Gina Berriault
- All Summer in a Day by Ray Bradbury
- The Pedestrian by Ray Bradbury
- There Will Come Soft Rains by Ray Bradbury
- The Veldt by Ray Bradbury
- The Minority Report by Phillip K. Dick
- The Machine Stops by E. M. Forster
- Thank You, M'am by Langston Hughes
- To Build A Fire by Jack London
- The Lottery by Shirley Jackson
- A Good Man is Hard to Find by Flannery OConnor
- The Last Dog by Katherine Paterson
- Icarus & Daedalus by Josephine Preston Peabody
- Harrison Bergeron by Kurt Vonnegut Jr
- Currents by Hannah Bottomy Voskuil
Informative & Procedural
- The Limits of Empathy by David Brooks
- Lessons from Failure by Bethany Brookshire
- Noticing Mistakes Boosts Learning by Alison Pearce Stevens
- How an 11-Year-Old Boy Invented the Popsicle by Shelly Pope for NPR
- This Tiny Animal is Apocalypse-Proof by Maria Temming
- Thai Cave Boys: The Psychology of Surviving Underground by Sarita Robinson
Personal Narrative & Memoir
- Superman and Me by Sherman Alexie
- My Side of the Story by Adam Bagdasarian
- Unusual Normality by Ishmael Beah
- The Save by Joseph Bruchac
- The Save by Joseph Bruchac Lesson Plan
- The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin
- Eleven by Sandra Cisneros
- On Turning Ten by Billy Collins
- The Hill We Climb by Amanda Gorman
- Everything Will Be Okay by James Howe
- Inside Out by Francisco Jimenez
- Where I'm From by George Ella Lyon
- The Party by Pam Munoz Ryan
- The Scholarship Jacket by Marta Salinas
- Tiny Love Stories compiled by The New York Times
- The Jacket by Gary Soto
- Seventh Grade by Gary Soto
- Fish Cheeks by Amy Tan
- Two Kinds by Amy Tan
- Lather and Nothing Else by Hernando Telliz
- Out of Bounds by Amanda Werner
- O Captain! My Captain! by Walt Whitman
Poetry
- "Adventures of Isabel" by Ogden Nash
- "A Poison Tree" by William Blake
- "Did I Miss Anything?" by Tom Wayman
- "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night" by Dylan Thomas
- "Eating Poetry" by Mark Strand
- "Fire and Ice" by Robert Frost
- "'Hope' is the Thing With Feathers" by Emily Dickinson
- "Identity" by Julio Noboa Polanco
- "If" by Rudyard Kipling
- "I'm Nobody. Who Are You?" by Emily Dickinson
- "I, Too" by Langston Hughes
- "Litany" by Billy Collins
- "My Shadow" by Robert Louis Stevenson
- "Nothing Gold Can Stay" by Robert Frost
- "Ode to Cheese Fries" by Jose Olivarez (mini lesson here)
- "One Art" by Elizabeth Bishop
- "On Turning Ten" by Billy Collins
- "O Captain! My Captain!" by Walt Whitman
- "See It Through" by Edgar Albert Guest
- "Still I Rise" by Maya Angelou
- "The Hill We Climb" by Amanda Gorman
- "The Cremation of Sam McGee" by Robert W. Service
- "The Rose That Grew From Concrete" by Tupac Shakur
- "The Snow Man" by Wallace Stevens
- "This Is Just To Say" by William Carlos Williams
- "Thumbprint" by Eve Merriam
- "We Real Cool" by Gwendolyn Brooks
- "Who Has Seen The Wind" by Christina Rosetti
- Middle/High School Printable Poems by We Are Teachers
- Name Poems - teachlivingpoets.com
- Poetry for Kids - poets.org
- Poetry Now - jump start poetry writing
Spooky Tales
- The House and the Brain by Edward Bulwer-Lytton
- The Landlady by Roald Dahl
- The Birds by Daphne du Maurier
- Click Clack the Rattle Bag by Neil Gaiman
- The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving
- The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving (excerpt)
- The Monkeys Paw by W.W. Jacobs
- The Wife's Story by Ursula K. Le Guin
- Button, Button by Richard Matheson
- The Open Window by Saki (HH Munro)
- The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe
- The Path Through the Cemetery by Leonard Q. Ross
- Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
- The Elevator by William Sleator
- The Medicine Bag by Virginia Driving Hawk Sneve
- The Night the Ghost Got In by James Thurber
- Three Skeleton Key by George G. Toudouze