Common Core Implementation Center
Empowering teachers with a place to find and share ready-to-use, practical CCSS ELA collaborative projects and resources.
A one-stop Common Core solution!
Watch this video to learn about the many ways the Common Core Implementation Center supports your teaching and learning.
Why ePals?
ePals can help you satisfy the Common Core State Standards no matter how much time you have.
Try This Now
Generate excitement about reading and opinion writing by sharing book reviews with the ePals student community!
Not a U.S. teacher?
This center is also for you! Find strong content-based literacy teaching ideas to help your students become more rigorous readers, thinkers, and writers.
CCSS Projects and Resources to Use Now!
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Project: Literature Circles
Students work in small groups reading a novel and assuming various roles in the Literature Circle in order to demonstrate their understanding of the novel and share...
Project: Email Exchange
Students will engage in an ePals email exchange, practicing the skills of collaboration and communication while building friendships and learning about the daily lives and cultures of others around the world.
Poetic Social Mission: Drops of Poetry--A One Drop Project
Guy Laliberte invites us all -- individually and collectively -- to contribute to the global change that will allow access to water for all, as is explained in his dream...
Collaborative Detective Story
Students will compose a collaborative narrative short story while creating international friendships and a great story to share.
21st Century Learning Tools Project
When students are a part of an online collaborative learning community, powerful learning takes place. Having the correct digital tools, like wikis, blogs, forums, email and media galleries, all in one place make for a rich learning environment ready for collaborative and interactive project work...
Monster Writing Project
Students attempt to recreate the monsters based on the description they received from other ePals.
Project: Building a Literacy Rich Classroom Community
This project lays the foundation for a successful classroom community in which all students feel trusted, safe and valued...
Project: Theme Detectives
Is it just a funny talking spider or do his antics serve a deeper cultural purpose? This project provides students with strategies they can use to understand the genre of traditional tales and how to identify the important lessons or themes.
Project: Biographies: Explorer Expedition
Follow in the footsteps of some of the world's greatest explorers through their biographies! In this project, students read explorer biographies to find out about historic adventurers, the dangers they faced, their motivation to explore and the lands they discovered.
Project: Intro to Nature Journal
Students exercise the observation skills that are essential to writing, visual art, and science. First, they try to use evocative language in describing pictures of birds from the Smithsonian's National Zoo.
Project: Climate Change Multi Classroom Collaborative Adventure
Students meet virtually through forum introductions and are challenged to find out about the causes and consequences of Climate Change by reading online articles from ePals Science Learning Center, share what they learn with other students.
Project: Natural Disasters Multi Classroom Collaborative Adventure
Students explore natural disasters around the world along with other ePals classrooms. Their goal is to find out what makes our earth shake, rattle and roll with tornadoes, hurricanes, tsunamis, wildfires and earthquakes by reading online articles from ePals Science Learning Center
Project: Invent It!
Transform your students into inventors that know how to think, explore, sketch, create, try, tweak and sell!
Natural Disasters: A Worldwide Look at Natural Disasters--A National Geographic Project
What do you do when the news warns of a big storm? In this project, students learn about the natural disasters of the world....
Global Warming: The Planet is Heating Up! A National Geographic Project
How can we help to save our planet from global warming? In this project, students learn about the effects of global warming and ways to reduce its effects on our planet...
Weather - Forecasting the Future: How Weather Works--A National Geographic Project
How is a good weather forecast made? In this unit, students will become meteorologists as they explore the conditions that make up weather...
World Weather Watchers: A Multi-Class Collaborative Weather Exchange--An ePals Project
What makes weather vary from place to place? Find out by virtually travelling to the classrooms of other ePals...
Weather Multi-Classroom Collaborative Learning Adventure--An ePals Project
Students explore Weather along with ePals from all over the world. Students read online articles from ePals Science Learning Center and conduct research together to find out what causes weather and how weather impacts our lives in different ways...
Disaster Trackers--An ePals Project
Students in two classrooms track and discuss real time disasters! They read to become experts on one disaster type and write to share their informational expertise.
Nature's Fury: Lessons from Historical Hazards--An ePals Project
How have natural hazards shaped the course of human history? What hazards have destroyed cities, altered the size of human populations, changed the course of rivers or driven human migration?
Reporting on Community Helpers
In this project, students explore their communities and report on community helpers...
Sister Cities, Twin Towns
The purpose of this project is to unite two classrooms from two schools in two Sister Cities, or Twin Towns, to promote mutual respect, cultural understanding and cooperative learning....
Project: We The People
The United States Constitution Preamble starts with "We the People". But, who are the people of the United States and where did they come from? Students' document and share firsthand accounts of immigration...
Project: Elementary Election Reporters
What do students have to say about the pressing issues being hotly debated on the campaign trail? In this Common Core project, kids dive into researching the most controversial issues of the election.
Project: Around the World: Digital Magazine Project
Through reading and discussing informative "Around the World" articles, and communicating personal cultural information using social media tools, students gain understanding of cultural heritage, individual identity and global connectedness...
Project: Is Your Leader Elected Too?
Research the history behind your country's leader and then have students exchange stories with another ePals class.
Project: Kids Report - Campaign Coverage
What do students have to say about the pressing issues being hotly debated on the campaign trail? In this Common Core project, kids dive into researching the most controversial issues of the election.
Project: What Are Constitutional Governments
This project is appropriate for American Government or History classes in which students are studying the U.S. Constitution and the founding period in American history. Students read and interpret Alexander Hamilton's "Introduction to the Federalist Papers"
Project: Teens Report - Campaign Coverage
What do students have to say about the pressing issues being hotly debated on the campaign trail? In this Common Core project, teens dive into researching the most controversial issues of the election.
Letter from Birmingham Jail, by Martin L. King, Jr.--An ePals Project
This project is part of a larger one on Civil Disobedience. This part is built around the study of Rev. Dr. Martin L. King Jr.'s Letter from Birmingham Jail...
Strategy: Graffiti Wall
Graffiti Walls welcome students to share their background knowledge by visually representing what they already know about a key concept on a large, blank canvas.
What are ePals CCSS Projects?
- Single or multi-classroom
- Learning collaborations
- Meet 8+ CCSS ELA Standards
- Interdisciplinary
- Integrate reading, writing and critical thinking
- Complete with supporting resources
- Make serious learning engaging!
Why the "Text" Matters
Master teacher Eleanor Dougherty shares her thoughts about "text" as one of the key components of Common Core teaching
Teacher Talk
Connect with grade-level colleagues to share implementation tips.
CCSS Instructional Video -- Purposeful Nonfiction Reading
Builds teaching skills for Reading Standards 1 and 2.
Brush up on several note taking techniques to increase comprehension and prepare students to write in response to informational text.
The Common Core State Standards
Download the standards from the official site:
Calling All Great Teachers!
Get recognized for great Common Core Teaching. Win a $2500 IRA award - Apply by November 15, 2013.
