Connecticut State Department of Education

Connecticut Core Standards

Units - English Language Arts

Units for Grades K-5

Grade Title
K Being a Good Kindergarten Citizen
K Story Time – Folktales from Around the World
K Document-Based Inquiry – Illustration Detectives: Gingerbread People
K Content Literacy – What is Bravery?
K How My Family Lives in America
K Listening & Learning Domain 3 Anthology – Stories
K Introduction to Nursery Rhymes and Fables
K Reading Environmental Print
K Skills Strand
K America the Beautiful – Using Music and Art to Develop Vocabulary
K Retelling Corduroy
1 Realistic Fiction – Why Do We Read It?
1 Content Literacy – People Who Work for Justice
1 BURRO’S TORTILLAS by Terri Fields – A Common Core Unit for ELLs
1 Short Focused Research Project – The Moon
1 Creative Problem-Solving with Ezra Jack Keats
1 Informational Text, Research, and Inquiry Circles – Animals and Habitats
1 Listening Strand – Fables and Stories
1 Skills Strand
2 Friends of Henry Ford – Speaking and Listening Unit
2 Dr. Martin Luther King
2 Biography
2 Newspaper Reporting
2 Listening & Learning Domain 12 Anthology "Fighting for a Cause"
2 Informational Text - Reading for Inquiry and Writing a Report
2 Realistic Fiction – Stories Matter
2 Author Study: Tomie dePaola
2 Listening Strand – Cycles in Nature
2 Reading and Writing About Whales Using Fiction and Nonfiction Texts
2 Skills Strand
3 Whose Story Is It? The Craft and Structure of Reading and Writing about History
3 Newspaper Reporting and Interviewing
3 My Librarian is a Camel - How Books are Brought to Children Around the World (Module 1, Unit 2, Lesson 2)
3 Speaking & Listening Unit
3 Gathering Evidence and Speaking to Others – The Role of Freshwater Around the World
3 Opinions Matter – Pre-Revolution Boston
3 Reading Informational Texts – The Declaration of Independence and the First Fourth of July
3 Extreme Weather: Content Literacy – Science
4 Grit in Charlotte's Web and Babe, the Gallant Pig
4 Coming to America – A Nation of Immigrants (1820-Present)
4 The Lightning Thief
4 Cinderella by Barbara McClintock – A Common Core Unit for ELLs
4 Be Aware! Be Prepared! – A research project on natural disasters and their impact on our lives
4 Wildfires
4 Perspectives on the American Revolution – Building Background Knowledge
4 Images and Metaphor – "The fog comes on little cat feet..."
4 Moving Toward Acceptance Through Picture Books and Two-Voice Texts
4 Using Literary Elements to Determine Theme – Tuck Everlasting
4 Scientific Research – Researching Simple Machines “How Do They Help Do Work?”
5 Wonderstruck
5 Research Pack – How Human Activity Impacts the Environment
5 “Casey at the Bat” by Ernest Lawrence Thayer
5 Storytelling in the Social Studies Classroom
5 Building Background Knowledge on Human Rights
5 Considering Perspectives and Supporting Opinions – Sports and Athletes’ Impact on Culture
5 A Closer Look at "Mother to Son"

Units for Grades 6-8

Grade Title
6 Heroes of the Iliad
6 Researching to Deepen Understanding – Prehistoric Art
6 Analyzing Structure and Communicating Theme in Literature – If by Rudyard Kipling and Bud, Not Buddy
6 Myths – Not Just Long Ago
6-8 The Power of Language
7 The Giver
7 Children Have a Right to...
7 Analyzing an Author’s Style – Macaulay’s Unique Way of Explaining a Complex Process
7 Investigating the Holocaust – A Collaborative Inquiry Project
7 Building Background Knowledge - How Working Conditions Change: Chavez and the UFW
7 Reading Closely and Writing to Learn – Journeys and Survival
7-8 Persuasion Across Time and Space Analyzing and Producing Persuasive Texts
8 A Midsummer Night’s Dream and the Comedy of Control
8 Research to Make A Point
8 Jumping Frog of Calaveras County
8 Text Analysis and Character Revelations - Flowers for Algernon
8 Close Reading of “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin - A Common Core Unit for ELLs
8 Sherlock Holmes - Reading like a Detective
8 Reading Closely for Textual Details - “And, above all, we had to learn English.”
8 UNBROKEN by Laura Hillenbrand and FAREWELL TO MANZANAR by Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston & James D. Houston
8 Persuasion in a Digital World – Finding Solutions to Food Waste
8 Voices from Little Rock – Understanding the Civil Rights Movement through Primary Sources
8 Building Background Knowledge – War Coming Close to Home

Units for Grades 9-12

Grade Title
9 Making Evidence-Based Claims - Plato’s Apology
9 Building Evidence-Based Arguments – “What is the virtue of a proportional response?”
9 Making Evidence-Based Claims About Literary Technique – “The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber” by Ernest Hemingway
9 Art and Poetry – English Language Arts and Visual Arts
9 Making It Visual for ELL Students – Teaching History Using MAUS
9-10 Writing Effective Research Papers for English Language Arts
9-10 Primary Source Exemplar - Human Rights, Conflict and Social Change
9-10 Reading Closely for Textual Details – “Brain Gain”
9-10 Reading Closely for Textual Details – “Modern Battlefield”
9-10 Words Matter
9-10 Literacy – The Power of New Media
9-10 Multimodal Autobiography Project
9-10 Researching to Deepen Understanding – Technology
9-12 Baseball, Race and Ethnicity – Rounding the Bases
10 Making Evidence-Based Claims about Literary Technique – Emily Dickinson, Robert Frost
10 Exploring Topics in Education
10 Building Evidence-Based Arguments – Search Warrant
11 "The Scarlet Letter"
11 Building Evidence-Based Arguments – “Cuplae poena par esto - Let the punishment fit the crime.”
11 Making Evidence-Based Claims - Louise Erdrich, Tim O’Brien
11 Making Evidence-Based Claims – “The Souls of Black Folk” W.E.B. DuBois
11 Copyright Infringement or Not? The Debate over Downloading Music
11 Nostalgia
11 The Art of Persuasion and the Craft of Argument
11-12 Writing Research Papers
11-12 Reading Closely for Textual Details – “Life Steps Almost Straight”
11-12 Reading Closely for Textual Details – “Lay Down All My Joys”
11-12 Researching to Deepen Understanding – Food
12 Making Evidence-Based Claims about Literary Technique - “What We Talk About When We Talk About Love,” Raymond Carver
12 Building Evidence-Based Arguments – “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”
12 Hamlet and Psychological Criticism
12 Making Evidence Based Claims - Ronald Reagan, Hillary Clinton