1. Elders

Sunday, September 13 is Grandparents Day, a holiday when we celebrate the wisdom of older people close to us. As a class, read an article in today's newspaper about an older person passing on knowledge to a younger person or a group of younger people. Then write a short poem about a special older person in your life, such as a grandparent, aunt, uncle, coach, teacher or neighbor. Read your poems aloud--with feeling!

Learning Standards: Writing fluently for multiple purposes, including poetry; identifying and explaining how individuals demonstrate good character and personal virtue.

2. Comics

A lot of stories in the newspaper are serious, so it's nice to have a comics page full of silly things. Look at the comics in today's newspaper to have a laugh. Then draw a comic of your own showing someone saying or doing something goofy. Share your comics with classmates. Then hang your drawings up in a Classroom Comics display.

Learning Standard: Reading and writing with developing fluency, speaking confidently, listening and interacting appropriately, viewing strategically and representing creatively.

3. Help from Dr. Elmo

Elmo, the lovable, furry character from "Sesame Street," wants you to stay healthy. So this fall Elmo will be appearing with his human friend Gordon in TV ads teaching kids and families how to stay healthy and not get the disease called swine flu. In the ads, Elmo teaches the importance of washing your hands, sneezing into the bend in your arm and not touching your face to avoid spreading swine flu. Touching your face after touching other things is a way to get infected. With family or classmates, talk about ways to avoid spreading diseases like flu to others. Discuss the importance of staying at home if you are really sick and not exposing others to germs or viruses. Then design a public service ad for the newspaper, showing people ways to stay healthy and not spread diseases like swine flu.

Learning Standards: Responding to a variety of oral, visual, written and electronic texts by making connections to students' personal lives and the lives of others; comprehending what constitutes good health and nutrition; using the craft of the illustrator to express ideas artistically.

4. A Thriller of a 'Thriller'

People do the darndest things to set records. And last week, on what would have been pop star Michael Jackson's 51st birthday, thousands of singers and dancers got together to try to break the world record for most people dancing to Jackson's hit song "Thriller." Organizers of the event in Mexico City, Mexico, say 12,937 people danced together in an attempt to break the record for most people dancing the moves from Jackson's music video of the song. The Guinness Book of World Records will decide this week if enough of the people danced all the steps to break the record set in May by a group of 242 college students at William and Mary College in Virginia. With classmates, find activities in the newspaper that you would like to do together to set a world record. Would they be serious? Silly? Just plain fun? Pick one write a paragraph asking people to join you in your record-breaking effort.

Learning Standard: Reading and writing with developing fluency, speaking confidently, listening and interacting appropriately, viewing strategically and representing creatively.

5. Reading Character

Recognizing character traits can help you predict and understand things in reading. A person's character traits are the kinds of attitudes they show over long periods of time. Someone may be kind, or funny, or mean, or dishonest. A person may help others, or pick on others. In teams or as a class, find a feature story in the newspaper that tells something about a person. On a sheet of paper, list the different character traits for the person. Finish by writing a sentence stating what kind of person the subject is. For added challenge, pretend that tomorrow you open the paper and read that the person had been arrested for shoplifting or been given an award for helping others. Could you have predicted either choice from the list of character traits you wrote out?

Learning Standards: Acquiring information from multiple sources; identifying and explaining how individuals demonstrate good character and personal virtue; writing fluently for multiple purposes.