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8th grade sub plans: ELA

One ELA lesson for every period of a 8th grade day, with no prep: a five-minute bell ringer, then How a Body Learns to Handle Summer Heat, a 257-word nonfiction passage with 7 questions and a key, a partner check, and an exit ticket at the door. The timetable runs 7 periods of 50 minutes; the lesson fits each one.

Checked October 30, 2026. Made from Peabody Teach's own passages, worksheets and brain break cards.

Make the whole day at 8th grade ▸

The lesson, every period

ELA: How a Body Learns to Handle Summer Heat

  1. First 5 minutes, the bell ringer: students answer this in a few sentences, “Do video games help or hurt learning? Support your claim with reasons and, where you can, evidence from your reading or your own experience.”
  2. Next 30 minutes: Hand out “How a Body Learns to Handle Summer Heat”, a nonfiction passage of 257 words. Print 24: the student copy is in this packet.
  3. Students read it on their own. Anyone who finishes reads it a second time and underlines the sentence they think matters most.
  4. Students answer the 7 questions under the passage, in full sentences.
  5. With five minutes left, go over two questions out loud. The answers are on the key page: keep it with you.
  6. Then partners compare answers. They pick one question they disagree on and find the sentence in the passage that settles it.
  7. Last 5 minutes, the exit ticket: one sentence on the most important idea in the passage and why. Students hand it to you at the door.
  8. Collect the work for each period in its own pile, with the period written on top.

📄 How a Body Learns to Handle Summer Heat (passage and key)

The sheets, on their own pages

Subbing 8th grade

Eighth graders are the oldest in a middle school and respond to being told the plan and trusted with it. They can read a passage alone, answer with evidence from it, and check a partner's work against the key.

  • Say the whole period's plan in the first minute, including what to do when finished.
  • Offer a small choice (which question to share, where to start) rather than a reward.
  • If work comes back unfinished, note who and why in the note to the teacher, without a lecture in the room.

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