The Kennedy Center: ARTSEDGE — the National Arts and Education Network

Grades 6-8 Lesson: Writing an Original Fable
In this lesson, students will use the steps of the writing process (brainstorming, drafting, revising, proofreading, and publishing) to write and perform original fables as skits.

Grades 6-8 Lesson: Writing Myths
Students will explore how myths provide explanations for nature and science. They will read and analyze the Native American myth "Giants and Mosquitoes."

Grades 6-8 Lesson: Writing Folktales
Students identify and analyze folktales. They learn the characteristics of folktales and use them to evaluate existing tales and to create original tales of their own.

Grades 6-8 Lesson: A World of Myths
In this lesson, students will explore how myths help to explain nature and science.

Grade 5 Lesson: Who Can Vote for President?
In this lesson, students will learn general facts about the voting process and its importance in a democratic form of government.

Grade 5 Lesson: Weather and Wind
This lesson introduces the expanding and condensing properties of air masses and the unequal heating of Earth as the force behind the wind

Grades 6-8 Lesson: We Are The Freedom Riders
Students will learn about the courageous efforts of the Freedom Riders while embracing the bold theme, "We Will Overcome!" as a theme surrounding the civil rights movement.

Grades 6-8 Lesson: A Way With Words or Say What?
Many words and phrases that we use every day were coined by Shakespeare. He is credited with inventing over 2,000 words and expressive phrases.

Grade 5 Lesson: US Presidential Election Process and the Campaign Trail
Students will create an original political campaign song for a fictional presidential candidate.

Grades 6-8 Lesson: Twelve-Bar Blues
Learn about the history, key players and musical qualities of the blues

Grade 5 Lesson: Trees in Nature and Art
Students will explore the use of trees in the arts (as paintings and poetry), understand basic science involved in forestry, and integrate tree arts and science in a final project.

Grades 6-8 Lesson: Tolerance: Gender Issues
In this lesson, students research how professions such as nursing, clerking, and teaching have changed gender dominance over the past 150 years in the United States.

Grades 6-8 Lesson: The Science of Shadow Puppets
Through online learning tools and the creation of shadow puppets and plays, students will learn how light interacts with matter

Grades 6-8 Lesson: Language of Ballet
This lesson introduces students to the French vocabulary of ballet. They will learn basic ballet vocabulary through both verbal and technological instruction.

Grade 5 Lesson: Tall Tales Today
In this lesson, students are introduced to the genre of American tall tales and will create an original tall tale featuring a "larger-than life" main character.

Grades 6-8 Lesson: Systems of the Body: Movement and Choreography
In this lesson, students will create movement patterns that express information about the basic systems, organs, and processes of the human body

Grades 6-8 Lesson: Sundiata, Mali’s Lion King
This lesson introduces the legendary Malian king Sundiata Keita, known as the Lion King of Mali, by using elements of traditional Malian festivals.

Grades 6-8 Lesson: Set a Poem to Music
After exploring a “singable” picture book as a class, each student examines a personally selected poem for rhythm to determine its musical meter.

Grade 5 Lesson: Searching For Cinderella
There are more than 300 versions and variations of the tale known as "Cinderella"

Grades 6-8 Lesson: Reliving History Through Slave Narratives
After reading narratives from former slaves that were recorded in the 1930's as part of the Federal Writers' Project, students will research slavery

Grades 6-8 Lesson: Puppets on the Move: China and the Silk Road
Through map-making, research, and class discussions, students will gain an understanding of the dynamics of trade in China along the Silk Road

Grade 5 Lesson: Political Cartoons as Part of the Election Process
Students will organize the information they researched on the U.S. presidential election process and constitutional rights.

Grades 6-8 Lesson: Playing with Puns
This theater and language arts lesson offers intellectual, creative and interpretive opportunities. Students will analyze and compare the puns and word play in selected scenes

Grades 6-8 Lesson: Planets in Balance
Students explore the solar system through experimentation of mobile design in the style of Alexander Calder

Grade 5 Lesson: Moving Tales
Students practice using their bodies to communicate through movement, improvisation, and pantomime games. Groups then read and interpret an assigned Grimm Brothers’ fairy tale