The Sparkly Notebook

Mastering the ELA Standards in Middle School

Paired Passages

Using Junk Food Paired Passages as a Halloween Theme

Add to your Halloween celebration this year by using this Junk Food Paired Passage as a prompt for both debate and writing exercises with your middle school students.

Halloween is a holiday celebrated with a bounty of treats. Whether students are enjoying school parties or trick-or-treating in their neighborhoods, their bags are often filled with sweets and goodies. 

As we plan how to incorporate Halloween into the school day, one approach is to use THIS argumentative paired passages about junk food.

Paired Passages: Junk Food

These passages explore the pros and cons of having junk food in schools. 

They present opposing viewpoints on whether junk food should be allowed in the school environment, making them perfect for a Halloween-themed debate.

As students prepare for and enjoy the Halloween season, consider having them read these passages and debate their own opinions on the subject. 

Should junk food be allowed in schools on Halloween? 

Can they construct a solid argument without letting personal opinions interfere?

Using the Junk Food Paired Passages for Writing Practice

Using Junk Food Paired Passages as part of your Halloween activities can also serve as a springboard for a complementary writing activity. 

Have students explore whether teachers and schools should be permitted to host Halloween parties or distribute candy as rewards. After reading the passages, students will have a foundation for their arguments, but they can also add in some additional research of their own.

Divide the class into two groups—one supporting the positive aspects and the other focusing on the negatives. 

Allow them time to research and develop their arguments, and since this is just practice, let them work in groups or pairs as well. 

For an added challenge, students could create presentations or suggest alternative snacks and items that could be allowed instead.

Halloween is a fun time of year, and there are many ways to celebrate it in the classroom. In addition to these paired passages, we also offer digital escape rooms focusing on ELA skills that can be used with your students leading up to Halloween.

Enjoy the season and use this festive time as an opportunity to practice debating and writing in a way that connects to your students’ lives.

Check out these additional Halloween activities for even more holiday fun!

Halloween Digital Escape Room - Reading Comprehension
Halloween Escape Room: Reading Comprehension
Halloween Digital Escape Room - Figurative Language
Halloween Escape Room: Figurative Langugage

Happy Halloween, everyone!

Our three most popular paired passage sets

When you’re looking for new resources for the new year, make sure that you take the time to check out our three most popular paired passage sets for middle school ELA.

If you’re anything like me, then at the beginning of the year, when you’re planning your content and checking your list of standards, you’re also on the lookout for some great resources that you can use to supplement the learning you already have planned.

I love finding resources that I can use in lots of different ways, and for me, paired passages are one of the most multi-functional resources in my teaching toolbox.

The Pros of Paired Passages

Paired passages are awesome for the middle school classroom because the passages are grade-level appropriate, connected in content, and based on high-interest topics.

Since so many of the standards we focus on in middle school ELA require passages in order to practice, the more high-interest paired passages you can have available, the better.

Paired passages can be used to support writing assignments and skills, to practice reading comprehension skills and strategies, and to form the basis of communication lessons like Socratic Seminars.

Paired passages give sources for students to use to make points or as evidence in their writing or during speaking practice.

In addition to all the ways I listed above, we also wrote a post about NEW ways you can use paired passages in middle school ELA. Click here to read that blog post!

Our Three Most Popular Paired Passage Sets

For some people, going into The Sparkly Notebook store and sorting through the tens of different paired passage sets available can be a bit overwhelming.

Let’s make it easy by sharing a secret with you.

We’re letting you in on our top 3 most popular paired passage sets. These tried-and-true sets are super high-interest and great for use with middle school ELA. Although each of these is grade-level specific, we have many of the same topics available for all three grade ranges. 

Click on the images below to take a closer look at each of our top three passages.

#1 | Video Games

The first is a paired passage set that discusses video games. This set is for 4th and 5th grade students, but we also have video game sets for 6th and 7th grades as well as 8th and 9th grades. 

Easy Middle School ELA Activities for the Weeks Surrounding Spring Break (Video Game Paired Passages)
Paired Passages – Video Games

#2 | Social Media Effects

The second paired passage set is about social media. Social media is a hot and very popular topic of debate and discussion in middle school ELA. This set is awesome for introducing some new thoughts or points that students can use to support their position.

Again, this set is designated for 6th and 7th grade, but we have sets available for the other grade levels as well.

Paired Passage Social Media Effects
Paired Passages: Social Media Effects

#3 | Phone-Themed Passages

Finally, rounding out our top three most popular paired passage sets are our phone-themed passages.

These passages about phones approach the topic of cellular devices from a couple of different angles. This particular set is for 8th and 9th grade students, but we have sets available for the younger grades as well.

Paired Passage: Iphone vs Android

Hopefully, you will find these paired passage sets as helpful and multi-functional as we do! To get the most bang for your buck, be sure to read our other blog posts that discuss our paired passages more in depth and how to use them in a variety of ways!

Using Paired Passages for Bell Ringers or Exit Slips
5 Things to Consider When Using Paired Passages in Middle School ELA
Practice Test-Taking Strategies with Paired Passages
32 Paired Passages to Use in Middle School ELA

Have a great day!

Activities for Comparing and Contrasting Author’s Voice/Purpose

Today, we’re providing 4 activities for comparing and contrasting the author’s voice/purpose.

Authors write for various reasons. Depending on their topic, authors might be trying to convince a reader to do something or spread a message to a wider audience through their work.

No matter what their purpose is, part of our job as educators is to help students identify the author’s purpose, analyze an author’s voice, and figure out why the author is trying to share that information with us.

The author’s purpose varies depending on the type of text being written.

Sometimes, an author is trying to entertain, persuade, or provide information on a topic. Other times, an author is not talking about a specific topic but rather trying to open our eyes to a specific theme or cultural issue that they want to address.

Often, students think that all literature, whether it is a poem, a piece of music, a book, an article in a newspaper, or even a blog post, is simply meant to entertain people and is up to the interpretation of the audience member,  but that is rarely the case.

Instead, most pieces of literature are written with a specific intent or purpose in mind, and we must be detectives as we try to figure out what hidden information, or sometimes even completely obvious information, the author is trying to share with us.

Today, we will explore activities for comparing and contrasting an author’s voice/purpose and provide different directions you can take as you work through this skill with your middle school ELA students.

4 Activities for Comparing and Contrasting Author’s Voice/Purpose

Activity #1 | Paired Passages

One direction I like to go when working with an author’s voice or an author’s purpose is to use paired passages written by the same person.  In The Sparkly Notebook Store, we have dozens of paired passages written by the same person on a variety of topics. Any one of these paired passage resources could be used as a way for students to analyze an author’s voice on a particular topic.

In addition to the passage being written by the same person, each paired passage set focuses both passages on the same topic. This opens up conversations for students to discuss the different ways that the author is framing the information in order to have a specific intent or purpose.

Students can use these passages to discuss and/or write about how the author uses the information, word choice, or examples to make their point.

Activity #2 | Informational Texts vs. Literature Texts

Another way to approach activities for comparing and contrasting authors’ voices/purposes is to break down how this looks different depending on whether the text is informational or literature-based. 

One of the best ways to broach this topic is to look at the way the standards for the author’s voice/purpose are written.

For each of these standards, we have developed a full unit study that teachers can use as they work through the author’s voice and the author’s purpose with their students. These units are fully built out and grade-level appropriate, so students can learn, review, and be assessed on the author’s intent, whether it is in the context of an informational text or a literature-based text. Click on the images below to learn more about each standard-based unit.

RI.6.6
RI.6.9
RI.7.6
RI.7.9
8.RI.6
8.RI.9

Grab FREE Middle School ELA Standard Breakdowns Below!

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Activity #3 | Author’s Purpose Similar Topics

Another activity you can try when working with an author’s purpose is to examine different authors’ purposes across a similar topic. 

An easy way to do this in modern times is to look at blog posts. Pull four blog posts on the same topic, all with different authors. 

Give students some time to read each, discuss what information is included in each, discuss what information is not included in each, and then spend some time discussing why the author may or may not have included the information they did. What was the author’s goal with this blog post? What was their purpose?

Another way to do the same activity is to look at news outlets covering the same major event. Choose an event that students would have some interest in. For example, you could choose an event that is taking place in sports, the Olympics, politics, or even music or gaming. Give students time to review the text or news reports and discuss how the author’s intent or purpose affected the way that the information was presented. 

Activity #4 | Same Author Different Texts

The last of our activities for comparing and contrasting an author’s voice/purpose involves looking at how the same author writes within different contexts. This can include reading two novels by the same author, two blog posts by the same author, or any other type of text in which the author writes about two different topics entirely.

Does the author have a way of writing that is consistent across the different topics? 

Do they have a specific type of topic that they prefer to write about? 

How does their intent or purpose change with the topic they are writing on?

Do they tend to write on the same themes or with the same amount of passion, no matter the topic?

The more students can understand how an author’s purpose can change the interpretation of a text, the less likely they are to be easily swayed by a singular interpretation of an event. 

Likewise, they will also begin to understand that words are rarely just words. Words are often filled with nuance and meaning, and it takes a skilled eye to truly understand the message that someone is trying to spread through their writing.

Hopefully, these activities for comparing and contrasting authors’ voices/purposes will inspire you to approach this topic with an open mind and creativity!

Set Middle School Students Up for Success with Classroom Procedures

You take steps toward creating a positive learning environment when you set middle school students up for success with classroom procedures.

Starting the school year off right with students is all about setting high expectations and instilling good classroom procedures to help everything run more smoothly.

Many teachers dive right into content at the beginning of the year without any regard for setting up the classroom procedures that will be the backbone of the expectations and environment we build within our classroom for the rest of the year.

Setting expectations for what students do when they come into the room, how they ask to use the restroom, or even how to approach the teacher about missing work will make working with the students much easier as the year moves on.

Classroom Procedures to Focus on in Middle School ELA

Here are some of the main classroom procedures we believe are most important to setting up a strong learning environment in middle school. This is by no means an exhaustive list, and for some of these things, the school may have a policy in place, but you should always address it explicitly in your class as well.

  • What are students expected to bring to class?
  • What happens if students do not bring all of their supplies to class?
  • Where are classroom supplies?
  • When are the supplies allowed to be used?
  • How are groups decided?
  • How are seating charts created?
  • How do students ask to use the restroom?
  • What happens when phones are seen? Heard? Used?
  • How and when is technology used in the classroom?
  • What will happen if students come to the room unprepared?
  • How should the student approach the teacher when they know they will be absent or tardy?
  • How should students approach the teacher if they have an emergency or unexpected absence?
  • How should students approach the teacher if they did not complete an assignment by the due date?
  • How and when will a teacher allow students to leave the classroom during instruction?
  • How should a student report to the teacher if a group member is not fulfilling their role in the group?
  • How should students approach the teacher if they have concerns about the content they are learning in the class?

One of the things that separates good classroom management from bad classroom management is having good classroom procedures in place and practicing them regularly. Being willing to go over classroom procedures, practice them, test on them, and expect them to be followed EVERY DAY creates a consistency that students learn to expect from you as a teacher and in your classroom environment.

Using Common Resources

In addition to setting up specific classroom procedures, having consistent practices such as expected bell ringer activities or exit slips also help with classroom management because students know exactly what they are expected to do as they come into the classroom or leave the classroom each day.

In this post, we talk about using Paired Passages as bell ringers or exit tickets, and we have enough paired passages available to use this strategy for the entire semester!

Benefits of playing sports paired passages
Paired Passages – Sports
High-Interest Paired Passages: Cell Phones
Paired Passages – Cell Phones
Easy Middle School ELA Activities for the Weeks Surrounding Spring Break (Video Game Paired Passages)
Paired Passages – Video Games

What additional classroom procedures do you go over with students? Do you have any special tips or tricks? We’d love to hear them!

Have a great day!

Grab FREE Middle School ELA Standard Breakdowns Below!

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Using Paired Passages for Bell Ringers or Exit Slips

I love a good resource that just keeps on giving, and when it comes to paired passages, I feel like I can just keep finding ways to use paired passages over and over.

Whether we are working on speaking and listening skills and doing some Socratic Seminars or working on writing skills that require students to pull information from other resources, paired passages, especially ones that focus on high-interest topics, are worth having on hand.

Previously, we wrote a blog post about 5 New Ways to Use Paired Passages.

5 Ways to Use Paired Passages

In that post, we talk about 5 activities.

  • Sentence Slips
  • Scavenger Hunts
  • Citation Practice
  • Facts First
  • Research Starters

However, I’m adding yet another activity option to that list.

Today, we’re talking about how paired passages can be used for bell ringers and exit slips.

What are bell ringers?

Bell ringers are activities students do right away at the beginning of class (as the bell rings). These activities typically practice previously learned skills or quickly, formatively assess skills that will soon be introduced.

What are exit slips?

Exit slips are another formative assessment strategy. 

Exit slips are a final task that students are asked to complete before leaving for the day. They can be related to the content that the class has been working on, or they can be a quick assessment or skill check of previously learned skills or standards.

Using Paired Passages for Bell Ringers and Exit Slips

When repurposing paired passages as bell ringers and exit slips, it’s important to remember that the whole passage and all of the questions don’t have to be used every time.

Honestly, we have enough paired passages in The Sparkly Notebook Store for you to use every day for most of the year, but that may not be totally necessary.

Instead, you could use a single paragraph or two and one or two questions for either a bell ringer or an exit slip.

The nice thing about paired passages is that you can pull paired passage topics your students are actually interested in.

We have a whole bunch of paired passages on various high-interest student topics. To see a more detailed breakdown of the available paired passages, check out this blog post!

32 Paired Passages to use in middle school ELA

Paired Passages as Formative Assessments

Since each paired passage includes a variety of questions, not unlike the types of questions asked during state testing, they are a really great way of quickly assessing your students’ skills in a way that you want to become familiar to them.

When using paired passages for bell ringers and exit slips, you can pick and choose the paragraphs and questions that specifically work on the skills you want to assess students on. 

Paired passages are just little gifts that keep on giving, and we want to keep giving you more and more ways to use them.

If you want to take a closer look at the many paired passages in The Sparkly Notebook Store, click here to see the full bundle and take a closer look at all the different topics you can choose to use with your students.

Have a great day!

Grab FREE Middle School ELA Standard Breakdowns Below!

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Which grade level are you most interested in?

5 Things to Consider When Using Paired Passages in Middle School ELA

Often people think paired passages can only be used exactly as they’re sold, but we’re here to tell you that there are a whole bunch of ways you can be using paired passages in middle school.

Today we are going through 5 things to consider when using paired passages in middle school ELA. We hope this list will give you some ideas for different ways to use paired passages but also encourage you to be selective about which paired passages you use for each activity.

If you love paired passages, make sure to head over to this blog post, where we provide 5 NEW ways to use paired passages in middle school ELA.

#1 | What’s the Standard?

What is the standard that you’re focusing on, and what do students need to do or practice for your students to engage with that standard?

Often we think that paired passages have to be used with reading standards, but that’s not true. In fact, depending on the passage you choose, the passages can be used for many of the standards in the ELA curriculum.

If you are working on a writing standard, you may use the paired passage as part of the research or citing practice, which is very different than using the paired passages to work on speaking standards through a discussion or even as part of a debate.

Know your goal first, and then use the passages to help your students meet your goals in the best way you can.

#2 | Which Passage?

We have over 30 paired passages in the store, so how do you choose which passage to use? 

First, is there a specific topic you’ve been discussing as a class? If there is a related passage, you may decide to use that one.

You could also choose passages based on student interest or with an upcoming holiday in mind.

With over 30 paired passages to choose from, you can be particular and pointed in your decision. You could even add in a little student choice by letting students pick from a selection of paired passages you’ve curated specifically for an assignment or lesson.

Since you have so many options, this is a great place to be picky!

#3| Both Passages or Just One?

Although paired passages come in sets, you don’t have to use both passages. Maybe you only need one passage for a particular assignment, or maybe there is one perspective that you specifically want to focus on.

Just because there are two doesn’t mean you actually need to use both at the same time!

#4 | Questions or Not?

We provide reading comprehension questions for every paired passage set in our store. Just because the questions are available does not mean you actually have to use them. 

If you are using the paired passages to work on a writing standard, the questions may not have any use to you at all. However, if you are using the paired passages daily as part of your morning routine, you may want students to do every question!

#5 | Print or Digital?

Lastly, since the paired passages are available as both print and digital resources, you can decide if you want students to work through them on their computers or on paper. 

If your students have been spending a lot of time on their computers, consider printing out the next set of paired passages you use. Or maybe the activity you’re doing requires the students to annotate directly on the passages.

You don’t have to commit to doing it the same way every time!

Paired passages can be magical in your classroom, but with so many different kinds, you can use them in different ways all year long!

Hopefully, some of the suggestions on this list have caused you to think of your paired passages in a whole new way!

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32 Paired Passages to Use in Middle School ELA

Much of teaching and learning in ELA is based on reading, analyzing, and pulling information from passages, and these 32 paired passages to use in middle school ELA were made specifically for this grade range and their interests.

We’ve got a passage for that.

When we talk with new middle school ELA teachers about the different ways to connect with students, we often bring up a variety of topics that students are interested in. We spend a lot of time listing topics like video games, cell phones, social media, and sports, and then we try to come up with examples to use in the classroom or projects or assignments we can do that will align with these topics.

Well, we’ve made it a lot easier to give students a chance to work with these types of high-interest topics with our Paired Passage product line.

In the Paired Passage product line, we have 30+ paired passages to use in middle school ELA that hit on topics middle school students actually care about and enjoy learning about.

What are Paired Passages?

Paired passages are sets of nonfiction passages that have a shared topic. Each passage looks at the topic from a different angle or purpose.

In our paired passages to use in middle school, we have also included reading comprehension questions for each passage so that teachers can easily use the passages for bell-ringers or as stand-alone assignments.

Ways to Use Paired Passages

Since each of our paired passages includes reading comprehension questions, they are great for test prep and practicing test-taking strategies. Teachers can gather a variety of passages and create practice tests for students to use as they prepare for standardized tests.

Paired passages can also be given to students as they practice making arguments and pulling information from sources.

We also like using paired passages as an introduction to a discussion session. Since the passages provide different points of view on the same topic, the discussion that can stem from the reading often results in a very heated give-and-take session with students that can be a fun and interesting way to work on listening and speaking standards.

New Ways to Use Paired Passages

Although you can always use paired passages to practice test taking or to read and discuss as a class, there are also many other ways to use paired passages.

In this blog post, we discuss several new (and unexpected) ways to use paired passages with your middle school ELA students.

30+ Paired Passages to Use in Middle School ELA

Here is the current list of the paired passage bundles available in The Sparkly Notebook Store. When you click on the bundle of the grade level you teach, you’ll have the option to select a specific topic or grab the whole grade level at a discount! 

Remember: Passages from other grade levels can also provide opportunities for differentiation!

Grade Level Bundles:

4th-5th Grade

6th-7th Grade

8th-9th Grade 

Topics Include:

  • Instagram vs. TikTok
  • iPhone vs. Android
  • Graffiti
  • Should We Ban Zoos?
  • Cell Phones
  • Video Games
  • Pizza
  • Running
  • Social Media Effects
  • Technology
  • Superheroes
  • Making the Team
  • Kids as Influencers
  • Advertisements
  • PlayStation vs. Xbox
  • School Uniforms
  • Live Life or Capture It
  • Benefits and Risks of Playing on Sports Teams
  • Football Safety
  • Participation Trophies
  • Fidget Toys
  • Is TV Worth the Risk?
  • Importance of Sleep
  • YouTube Fame
  • Reality TV
  • Fact or Fiction Online
  • Owning a Pet
  • In-Person or Virtual
  • Healthy Eating
  • Mac vs. PC
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Using High-Interest Paired Passages to Teach the Standards

Using high-interest paired passages helps you connect with your current students and engage with them on topics they actually enjoy.

I remember the day I realized I was getting older.

I was providing a real-world connection to a novel we were reading, and I mentioned someone from a high-profile event that I thought my students would know.

My students simply stared at me.

They had no idea who I was talking about.

How could that be?

I brought up a picture of the person and explained it again, certain that they had misunderstood what I said.

Then I noticed the date on the picture, and I realized that the case I was referencing took place when I was in middle school. It was not even from this decade.

That’s when I understood their confusion.

At first, I felt a little sad. I was officially old… or at least that is what my inner voice was saying.

Now, years later, I look back on that same experience with a completely different perspective.

It wasn’t that old, but it was a very old reference for my students.

Staying current is important as a teacher!

Even though I may still be a spring chick, I am old to my students, and I have to be careful to use content that they actually know and understand.

Making Connections with High-Interest Paired Passages

Now, I am much more aware of what kinds of examples I use around my students rather than using examples from ‘back in the day.’ I use recent examples that they will understand.

I have begun really focusing on finding content for lessons that align with my students’ interests and topics that are very relevant to them.

Since we do a lot of reading passage work, I often find myself looking for and creating high-interest paired passages.

When I talk about topics like video games and TikTok in passages, my students are engaged and are able to make their own connections.

Ways to use Paired Passages

We can use these types of passages to discuss all sorts of things.

They can be a springboard for a Socratic Seminar, a resource for a research paper or project, or a way to compare and contrast viewpoints.

Since each of the paired passages addresses the topic from a different angle, we can use the passages in various activities that work on a variety of standards and skills.

Some additional activities you can try with these high-interest paired passages include…

  • Sentence Slips
  • Citation Work
  • Research Starters
  • A Scavenger Hunt
  • Facts First

To learn more about each of these activities, read this post which explores 5 New Ways to Use Paired Passages!

New Ways to Use Paired Passages Blog Image

Paired Passage Topics to Engage with Students

Now that I am more aware of my students’ needs and interests and what kinds of topics they like to engage with, I spend time making high-interest paired passages on a variety of topics.

Here are some of the topics my students are currently into.

TikTok

Paired Passages Resource

Social Media

Social Media Paired Passages

Sports

Video Games

Easy Middle School ELA Activities for the Weeks Surrounding Spring Break (Video Game Paired Passages)
Kids as Influencers
High-Interest Paired Passages: Kids as Influencers

Cell Phones

High-Interest Paired Passages: Cell Phones

Each of these high-interest paired passage sets are differentiated for different grade levels and reading abilities and have built-in questions to start conversations and get students to consider the topic more thoroughly.

They are a great way to make your classroom content relevant and interesting for your students and make you feel a lot more ‘hip’ too!

Enjoy!

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Practice Test-Taking Strategies with Paired Passages

Read about high-interest topics while you practice test-taking strategies with paired passages.

We love when students love reading, but we’ve found that our students don’t love reading when they have to read about topics they struggle to connect with.

Shocker, right?!? (Yep. That was sarcasm!)

Although students may need to know that the Stamp Act took place, a non-fiction passage about the Stamp Act is not something they will probably get really excited to read.

When you are practicing test-taking strategies related to reading, find highly engaging passages for students to work with. Testing is not really exciting, but when we are practicing test-taking strategies with paired passages, there are no rules that say you have to pick passages that are just as dull as a typical standardized test passage.

Why read about the Stamp Act when you can practice test-taking strategies with paired passages about social media, TikTok, video games, sports, and so much more?

What’s Included in a Paired Passage

Before we talk about test-taking strategies, let’s talk about what these paired passages look like.

Each paired passage set includes passages that are focused on a common topic, and each passage includes a set of reading comprehension questions to test a student’s knowledge.

You can also create your own questions to go along with a passage or ask students to use the paired passages to support their writing practice. 

We love paired passages so much; in fact, we’ve come up with a whole bunch of different ways to use them. You can read about the ways we like to reuse our paired passages in this post!

Paired Passages also challenge students to think about the text in a different way. In this post, we’ve talked about how paired passages can prepare students for testing situations.

Practice Test-Taking Strategies with Paired Passages

There are a variety of test-taking strategies out there, and these paired passages allow you to put your students in a test-like situation so they can practice several of those strategies.

Maybe you are practicing taking timed tests. If you know that students are typically given 60 minutes on their reading tests, and the reading test includes six passages, then you can give your students 10 minutes to complete one of the passages. 

Maybe you are working on narrowing down answer choices. Use the questions that come with the paired passages to practice figuring out which answers can be thrown out and which ones need to be seriously considered.

Maybe you are teaching your students how to quickly annotate a passage to help them be more successful in a testing situation. Use one of these paired passages to demonstrate how you might do that.

For more test-taking tips, check out this blog post!

The paired passages we have in the store are very similar to the passages that students may encounter during testing situations, making them great for you to use as you practice test-taking strategies.

Take a closer look at all the different paired passage topics we have available here!

Testing doesn’t have to be scary, and you can do a lot to prepare your students when you practice test-taking strategies with paired passages! 

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Easy Middle School ELA Activities for the Weeks Surrounding Spring Break

Sometimes leading into Spring Break or coming out of Spring Break puts some strain on the flow of your middle school classroom. In this post, we’re introducing a few easy middle school ELA activities for the weeks surrounding Spring Break.

It’s coming!

Spring Break, and boy do you all deserve a great break this year.

But as we all know, Spring Break time in the middle school classroom is not all flowers and rainbows. It is often a time of chaos, crazy, and a little bit of confusion.

The week leading into Spring Break, and the one coming out of Spring Break can be very difficult weeks for middle school ELA teachers.

So this year, we want to help.

We are rounding up some of our best low/no prep activities that you can do in those weeks surrounding Spring Break to keep your students moving forward with the standards, while also providing teachers with a little extra time to get everyone and everything organized and ready to push through to the end of the school year.

4 Easy Middle School ELA Activities for the Weeks Surrounding Spring Break

Spring Digital Escape Room [ELA Reading Comprehension]

Easy Middle School ELA Activities for the Weeks Surrounding Spring Break (Digital Escape Room)

Students can practice several ELA reading comprehension skills while enjoying a bright spring-themed escape room.

This escape room is standards-aligned and great for digital learning or as an in-class individual or small group activity.

Just because it is Common Core-aligned doesn’t mean it’s boring. Students love solving the riddles and reading spring-themed passages that will lead them to ‘escape’ the room they’re in so they can go out and enjoy the sunshine and flowers.

This Spring Digital Escape Room includes 5 ready-to-go tasks that your students can dive into within minutes of receiving their link. 

Note: This escape room is digital, so no locks or boxes are necessary!

Sign Up for a FREE plot structure digital escape room!

 


 
 
 
 
 
 


 

Easter Digital Escape Room [Figurative Language]

Easter Figurative Language Escape Room Resource

Figurative language always seems to squeeze its way into those standardized tests at the end of the year, which makes this Easter-themed escape room even more valuable as you look for easy middle school ELA activities for the weeks surrounding Spring Break.

This escape room is digital, so you can share it with a link, and it is a completely stand-alone activity, which helps when you’re trying to get students resituated after Spring Break.

Social Media Inspired Paired Text (Passages)

Paired Passages Resource
Social Media Paired Passages

High-interest reading on topics your students love to talk about is also great add-on activity for the weeks around Spring Break.

Since social media is such a hot topic, doing some reading about things like social media platforms or Live Social Media may be just the thing you need to keep them engaged when Spring Break is on the horizon.

We’ve got paired reading texts available to discuss both of these social media topics as well as several other high-interest topics that middle schoolers are always talking about.

If you want even more ways to use these paired passages in your classroom, make sure to read this blog post called New Ways to Use Paired Passages! It has some great little nuggets you’ll want to explore!

Video Games Inspired Paired Text (Passages)

Last, but certainly not least, let’s talk video games. 

Since many of your students will be playing games over break, this paired passage set may be the perfect complement to your students’ Spring Break plans.

This differentiated bundle is also helpful as you approach testing time and the way the passages are set up supplement test prep really well!

It’s OKAY to Review!!

In those weeks surrounding Spring Break, it is okay to focus on topic and skill review using games and reading passages. As testing time is quickly approaching, good skill practice is great for students, and the digital activities on this list allow students to review in a way that doesn’t feel redundant.

For a few more easy middle school ELA activities for the weeks surrounding Spring Break, take a look at this post about three quick digital sorting activities students can use to practice ELA skills in the classroom!

We hope you all get a chance to have a relaxing Spring Break and take a little time to disconnect and enjoy the spring season!

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