After reading on an academic topic, such as the history and spread of the AIDS pandemic, have students create a metaphor on the topic. Model this for them, perhaps drawing from the reading, and give a reason for the choice of metaphor: “AIDS is a black box” (because it’s a record of what happened and where we’ve been) and “AIDS is a black hole” (it sucks in and destroys what it comes contact with). Students can get quite creative: “AIDs is a swamp” and “AIDS is an hour glass.” This is effective because it gets students really thinking about the nature of the concept to create the metaphor. It also leads to acquisition of more specific vocabulary: learning, for example, that “swamp” is more descriptive for AIDS and the notion of being caught and sucked down than “marsh.”