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CKLS School Librarians: Informational Text Resources

The Central Kansas Library System has a commitment to school districts that have joined CKLS as system members. We provide consulting, continuing education, and a number of library services for member school librarians and paraprofessionals.

Target Middle Schoolers but upper and lower grade materials available with some links

All Sides for School: For middle school through college students, choose from short classroom activities, online tools, and in­-depth lesson plans that teach: News Literacy, Civil Dialog  and Life Skills.

DocsTeach:  Help your students think through primary source documents for contextual understanding and to glean information to make informed judgments. This site provides primary source documents and lessons.

$$Dogo News: current event articles, book and movie reviews for kids.  You write your own assignments or workbooks available for purchase

Kansas State Library:  Student Research: Almost 30 databases which includes General Research, Issues & Controversies, Skill Builders, Social Sciences, Health, Medical, & Science, Literature & Art, Database Tools, Government, and En Espanol. 

Kansas State Library: Research for Kids  6 databases specifically targeting K-3 grades

$$ New York Times/Learning Network: current event articles and lessons including a student opinion section 

New York TImes: Room for Debate NY Times current article debated by journalists.  Good for discussion, comparison, critical thinking activities

$$ NEWSELA:  Current event news articles with written at multiple Lexile levels to accommodate a range of reading levels. 

PBS News Hour Extra: Currents event articles for students and teacher resources  6th-12th grades

ProCon.org: By Britannica    Pros and Cons of Controversial Issues   Good debate topics

ReadWorks.org: Access to 1,000 Lexile leveled, CC aligned nonfiction passages and lesson plans.  Free with sign-up.

Teaching with the News: The CHOICES Program's Teaching with the News initiative (Brown University) provides online curriculum materials and ideas to connect the content of the classroom to the headlines in the news.

Tween Tribune: Each day they post  interesting news for kids aged 8-18. Stories are selected by teens and tweens working closely with professional journalists. Teens and tweens can comment upon these stories.

Youngzine:  A
 one-of-a-kind Web site where children can learn about current news and events shaping their world -- in a simple, engaging and interactive manner.

English Language Arts Resources

Lexile.com: Look up Lexile measures for books, and also allows you to upload documents to determine their Lexile level
Read, Write, Think: Lesson plans, student interactives, apps, calendar activities and printouts for use with your students
Argumentative Writing: Educator resources, lesson plans and student activities from the Utah Education Network

Math and Science Resources

Inside Mathematics: a professional resource for educators passionate about improving students' mathematics learning and performance. This site features classroom examples of innovative teaching methods and insights into student learning, tools for mathematics instruction that teachers can use immediately, and video tours of the ideas and materials on the site.