1. Labor Day

On Monday, the nation celebrated Labor Day. Labor Day is a holiday set aside to honor working Americans. Find an article in this week's newspapers about a person with a job you find interesting. Write down ideas for a short story about what your day might be like if you had that job. Give your story an exciting or fun title. Then write the beginning paragraph of your story.

Common Core/National Standards: Producing clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization and style are appropriate to the task, purpose and audience; demonstrating the ability to write clear and grammatically correct sentences, paragraphs and compositions.

2. Definition Please!

We call the parts of the alphabet letters, but really they’re just symbols. And when we put them together, they create words. Over time, these words are assigned meanings that we can find in any dictionary. It is important to understand the meanings of words so you can understand what you are reading. Search your newspaper for a story that interests you. Cut or print it out and highlight the words you don’t know. Look them up in the dictionary and write down their definitions. Use three of them in complete sentences of your own.

Common Core/National Standard: Determining the meaning of general academic and domain-specific words and phrases in a text

3. A Hero Remembered

“That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.” This famous quote came from U.S. astronaut Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon. He died August 25 at the age of 82. In 1969 Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon’s surface and spent three hours collecting samples, conducting experiments and taking photographs, according to an Associated Press story. Before becoming an astronaut, Armstrong was a Navy fighter pilot and an engineer. When a person passes away, newspapers run obituaries that tell about the person’s life. Search your newspaper for obituaries. Using them as examples, choose a famous person, do some research and write an obituary giving highlights of the person’s life.

Common Core/National Standard: Producing clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization and style are appropriate to the task, purpose and audience.

4. Snake Alert

Forget movies about snakes on planes. Arizona residents are dealing with rattlesnakes on a more personal level. According to an article in the Arizona Republic, the number of rattlesnake bites has increased dramatically this summer. Three people in the Phoenix area were bitten in one night, and 14 bites were reported in the Tucson area. As August ended, there had been 49 bites in Tucson and 25 in Phoenix. Typically, there are more snakebites in August and September than in other months because of storms and because baby snakes are born at the end of July and early August, the article said. Snakebites from baby snakes may be even more dangerous than bites from adults, because babies’ venom is more potent. Also, baby snakes are harder to see and their rattle isn’t as loud. Find a newspaper story, photo or ad featuring a dangerous animal. As a class, discuss ways to stay safe when around animals that can be dangerous.

Common Core/National Standard: Engaging effectively in a range of collaborative discussions

5. The Ice Cream Cop

In April of this year, Chris Rosnik found himself out of a job. He was one of 12 Oak Park, Michigan, police officers to get laid off because of the city budget, according to a Detroit Free Press article. Looking for a way to stay in the community and earn a living, Rosnik decided to get out of the business of protecting the citizens and into the business of satisfying their sweet tooths. He opened an ice cream shop with the help of a local businessman. Rosnik had worked in an ice cream shop during his teens and remembered how happy a scoop of ice cream could make people. As a class, discuss your favorite kinds of ice cream. Then brainstorm a new kind of ice cream that people would want to try. Draw an ad for the newspaper telling people about your ice cream and why they should try it.

Common Core/National Standards: Engaging effectively in a range of collaborative discussions; using drawings or visual displays when appropriate to enhance the development of main ideas or points.

1. Good Eats

Anyone who has spent time in a hospital knows that hospitals aren't known for their food. Hospital food has a bad rep for being bland, soggy and just not very appealing. The Henry Ford West Bloomfield Hospital in Michigan is trying to change that. It recently added a $1 million greenhouse to its grounds. Hospital workers now are growing such things as fresh lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, okra, squash, peppers and strawberries to use in patient meals and in the hospital's café. The 1,500-square-foot greenhouse also has an attached educational center open to the public to teach people about healthy eating and its role in health and disease prevention. Search your newspaper or the Internet for healthy recipes that you could prepare with your family or class. Pick one and write a paragraph explaining why it appeals to you and why it’s good for you.

Common Core/National Standards: Producing clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization and style are appropriate to the task, purpose and audience; demonstrating ways to maintain personal and family health.

2. Reading Out Loud

As a class, read a short news story in today’s newspaper out loud, with each classmate reading a sentence or two. Then discuss the event that happened in the article. Finish by drawing a comic strip that shows what happened in the story. Give your comic a creative name.

Common Core/National Standards: Using drawings or visual displays when appropriate to enhance the development of main ideas or points; reading and writing fluently at grade level; integrating listening, speaking, viewing, reading and writing skills for multiple purposes and in varied contexts.

3. A Big Dog Party

Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday, dear Clifford! Hard to believe, but Clifford the Big Red Dog turned 50 last week. Author Norman Bridwell, 84, wrote the first Clifford book 50 years ago, when he was a struggling artist trying to make it in New York City. He sent out 10 paintings to publishers, hoping to be a children's book illustrator. The paintings were rejected, but one staff person told him the only way he would get published is to write his own book. He wrote "Clifford the Big Red Dog," and today there are 90 Clifford books in 13 languages, a television show, stuffed animals and more. The girl in the stories, Emily Elizabeth, is based on Bridwell's daughter by the same name. Find a story in the newspaper that interests you. Turn that story into your own Clifford story and illustrate it.

Common Core/National Standard: Producing clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization and style are appropriate to the task, purpose and audience.

4. Let's Have Fun!

If you live in Detroit, Michigan, you may have noticed an odd trend: Children and grownups playing hopscotch along the sidewalks of the city. An effort called Hopscotch Detroit was organized to set a world record for the longest hopscotch course for the website www.recordsetter.com, according to a Detroit Free Press article. Volunteers started applying chalk squares on sidewalks in the downtown area and didn't stop until four miles later. The idea behind the hopscotch event was to promote the city as a place where fun things are happening. Search your newspaper for fun events in your community. Write a paragraph describing one event that interests you, and why. Then attend the event — for fun!

Common Core/National Standard: Producing clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization and style are appropriate to the task, purpose and audience.

5. Election 2012: Give Us Energy!

Debate over energy and the environment has gone on in the United States for years. Should the nation drill more for oil and gas or should it go for clean energy sources? Are hybrid cars better? Can we switch to solar or wind energy? These are issues the two presidential candidates will debate in this year's election and the issue you will debate as a class this week, using information from your newspaper. Presidential candidate Mitt Romney is pledging to make the U.S. independent of energy produced outside the U.S. by 2020 through aggressive exploration for oil, gas, coal and other resources, along with drilling in ocean areas, western lands and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. President Obama ordered a temporary moratorium on deep-water drilling after the massive BP oil spill, approved a drilling plan in the Arctic Ocean, set a goal of cutting oil imports in half by 2020 and proposes that Congress give oil market regulators more power to control price manipulation. As a class, debate how the U.S. should proceed on energy, and vote at the end.

Common Core/National Standard: Propelling conversations by posing and responding to questions that relate a current discussion to broader themes or larger ideas.