Description

Turn your classroom into an eerie, text-rich escape room. In Escape from the Haunted Library, students analyze tone vs. mood, diction, syntax, and theme through interactive slides for Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart,” Shelley’s Frankenstein, and Jacobs’s “The Monkey’s Paw.” Excluding audio instructions, there are 22 resources in this unit!

Don’t Have Time? There is a 2-day jigsaw lesson plan to take you through these haunting texts!

Haven’t read the texts? No worries! A two-page text of concentrated excerpts from each story is provided, allowing students to read and grasp the gist of each text and answer the applicable questions. I have included links to the free PDFs of each of these texts for download.

You’ll get a PowerPoint (with audio), Google Slides copy links, printable excerpts of each story, decision questions, task cards, a CER mini-assessment, and step-by-step Teacher Notes with both a 2-day jigsaw and 5-day core unit plan. Evidence-before-click routines keep gameplay academic—and the finale ties it all together with a reader-response reveal: “The Library Lives.” The Teacher Notes take you day by day through the teaching of the unit.

That is not all! This unit is packed with fun ways to teach tone and mood through diction, connotation, and syntax. This unit includes ALL of the following:

What’s Included (print + digital)

• Escape from the Haunted Library slides
  • PowerPoint with embedded audio (best for sound)
  • Google Slides copy link (audio hosted via shared Drive folder)
• Teacher Notes (PDF) with pacing options, grouping norms, “evidence before click” protocol, finale variations, and slide-by-slide guidance (right/wrong reasoning, prompts). Slide Notes also included!
• Student Text Pack (PDFs): short, classroom-safe excerpts for Poe, Shelley, Jacobs (for direct annotation).
• Decision Question One-Pagers (by author): evidence-led MC prompts and Mixed-Group Chart (jigsaw) and Comparison Chart (whole class) for recording quotes, tone, and literary devices.
• Jigsaw Player Guide + Mixed-Group Comparison Chart (expert share-outs).
• Task Cards (syntax validation) & Code Cards (SIL / EN / CE) for the finale.
• Tone vs. Mood mini-lesson (Slides) and Precise Mood–Tone Word List.
• Semantic Sorts with a Dark Twist (semantic word sort) for warm-ups.
• Theme Snap Sheet (claim + 2–3 evidence points) and CER paragraph prompt & 10-pt rubric (mini-assessment).
• Transfer the Tone activity (students rewrite a passage to change tone; PPT/GS + PDF).
• Audio use guide (how to run sound in PPT and Google Slides; silent-mode option).
• Quick Write (quick write on how literary devices used by the author create tone)
• Exit Ticket (for end-of-class accountability)

Links included in Teacher Notes: Google Slides “Make a Copy,” Audio Folder (Drive), Tone & Mood mini-lesson deck, and Transfer the Tone deck.

Tech Notes

• Best audio experience: PowerPoint in Slide Show mode.
• Google Slides: ensure the shared Audio Folder is accessible (“Anyone with link → Viewer”); if your district blocks audio, use silent-mode—gameplay still works.

FAQ

Do students need the full texts?
No—excerpt packets are included; all decisions and evidence live inside the excerpts.

Can I run it without sound?
Yes. Mute for silent mode; slides, prompts, and assessment still deliver the learning.

Is it strictly Halloween?
No. The tone is eerie but text-centric (no gore). Works any time you teach mood/tone, diction, syntax, and theme.

Group size?
Teams of 3–4 are ideal; the notes include whole-class vs small-group guidance and an “evidence before click” routine.

Note: This resource was first created for TpT, hence the information slides referencing my TpT store. I will revise those slides referencing TpT in the future – but for now- enjoy this resource and thank you for shopping at TeacherStore.io!