1. News Challenge

Look at the front page in today's newspaper. Make a list of three facts you learn from the newspaper. For instance, you might write "Hillary Clinton is U.S. Secretary of State" as one fact. Create a News Challenge by turning your facts into questions, like "Who is the U.S. Secretary of State?" Take a News Challenge by swapping questions with a friend or family member, and see if you can find the answers to his or her questions on the front page.

Learning Standard: Acquiring information from books, maps, newspapers, data sets and other sources; organizing and presenting the information; interpreting the meaning and significance of the information; using a variety of electronic technologies to assist in accessing and managing information.

2. Good Choices

With family or friends, read about an ongoing news-making story in today's newspaper. Discuss what decisions and choices were made along the way that have brought the situation to where it is right now. Do you think the present situation is a good one? Would you have made the same decisions? If not, why not? If so, why? Write your ideas in few sentences.

Learning Standard: Selecting decisions made to solve past problems and evaluating those decisions in terms of ethical considerations, the interests of those affected by the decisions and the short- and long-term consequences in those decisions; writing fluently for multiple purposes.

3. Intro to U.S. Classrooms

A summer program in New York City is helping kids who recently arrived in the United States from war zones to prepare for something big: American public schools. The Refugee Youth Summer Academy is a six-week program that teaches students from places like Iraq, Afghanistan and other areas of conflict how to go to school -- and what they'll learn when they're there. This summer there are around 120 kids in the academy, and most of the kids have been in the U.S. for less than 18 months. They will enroll in kindergarten through 12th grade this fall after learning about school in the program run by the International Rescue Committee. Look through the articles and ads in the newspaper for examples of five things you appreciate but often take for granted, such as school or a permanent house. Write a letter to your mom or dad, a teacher or another adult thanking him or her for things you have been given.

Learning Standards: Responding to a variety of visual, written and electronic texts by making connections to students' personal lives and the lives of others; writing fluently for multiple purposes to produce compositions, such as personal narratives, persuasive essays, lab reports and poetry.

4. Worry Warts

According to the Anxiety Disorders Association of America, about one in eight kids have some type of anxiety problem. Now research published in the journal Nature may help kids deal with anxiety problems. Scientists from the School of Medicine and Public Health at the University of Wisconsin-Madison looked at the part of the brain that makes people nervous and how genetic and environmental factors play a part. The scientists studied the brain activity of 238 rhesus monkeys and found that anxious monkeys showed behaviors similar to those of anxious kids, such as being shy or inhibited. With the information gained from the study, scientists were able to predict which monkeys were more likely to be anxious. Researchers hope the findings will help determine kids who are at risk for anxiety before anxiety becomes a problem. Read the newspaper to find an issue that someone your age may be facing, such as problems at home or at school. Write down a list of ways the situation could be made better. If someone is facing this problem, to whom should they turn? Write a paragraph explaining your answer.

Learning Standards: Using oral, written and visual texts to identify and research issues of importance that confront adolescents, their community, their nation and the world; writing fluently for multiple purposes.

5. Swing, Batter, Batter

The first Major League Baseball game that aired on television was between the Cincinnati Reds and the Brooklyn Dodgers at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, New York. The game took place on August 26, 1939 and was shown on W2XBS, which is now WNBC-TV. At that time there were only around 400 television sets in the entire New York City area. Now, sports on television is a multi-billion dollar industry (and the Dodgers are in Los Angeles!). Choose an article from the newspaper sports section about a recent professional game. Pretend you are a television sportscaster and write a 30-second spot that accurately tells the highlights of the game. Time yourself to be sure your TV report is no more than 30 seconds.

Learning Standards: Communicating information accurately and effectively and demonstrating expressive abilities by creating oral, written, and visual texts that enlighten and engage an audience.