Jessica Mitchell's Student and Teacher Lesson Plans

Student created assignments--9th Basic English--Austin High School--Special Education Dept.

1. Submitted by Cynthia Perez--Basic English I.
"I want students to read the obituaries t0 see what information makes up the obits and to determine the purpose of having obits in the newspaper. Students will have to name one thing each obit has in common and also determine why people would write obits and put them in the paper."
2. Submitted by Junior Esco--Basic English I.
Students will read the comic strips and find all comics that make a reference to a cultural topic. What comment is that comic strip making?
3. Submitted by Destiny Marin--Basic English I.
Students read their horoscope and complete the following tasks:
a. summarize your horoscope in your own words.
b. do you agree with your horoscope for today? why or why not?
c. Find a sign of your best friend and read their horoscope.
d. summarize your friend's horoscope in your own words.
e. will you share your friend's horoscope with them? Why or why not?
f. Create your own horoscope by writing like the author of the horoscopes in the paper.


Jessica Mitchell
Special Education English Teacher
Austin High School

Follow a Lead

Objective: Students will collect information published over a set amount of time about a particular topic and will interpret the development of that information throughout the given timeframe.

Lesson: Students will either be assigned a particular topic or will choose a topic of interest to them that they can read about in the paper daily for a set amount of days, weeks, months, etc… Students might want to follow a story about a court case that receives national attention or about a particular sports team that they are interested in following for example. At the beginning of class daily, students will be responsible for finding information about their chosen topic and for updating a log with the new information learned from the newspaper on that day. If there is not a reference to their chosen topic in the paper they have in class on a given day, students must research other papers (online or in the library) in order to find something that has been written on the subject for that day to add to their logs. If newspapers stop reporting on the selected topic, students can write an opinion statement indicating why the topic is no longer being written about. As students read about their chosen topic day to day, they should take note of new information included in the write-up, the varying opinions that are surfacing in the paper about the topic, and the location of the information within the paper from day to day (lead story, blurb in a different article, etc…).


I See, You See

Objective: Students will compare and contrast two or three articles written about a topic that have been printed in different newspapers.

Lesson: Students will choose an article of interest to them within the Austin-American Statesman. They will then search for articles written about the same topic in other newspapers around the state, country, or world (depending on the topic chosen). Students will compare and contrast the articles, taking note of similarities and differences in style, placement, point-of-view, opinion, word choice, headline, etc…Students then write opinion pieces explaining why they believe the coverage of that topic differs from one paper to another.