Lesson Plan 5

Title: Speak up Speak out: What do you care about? Step up Step in. NOW is the time to participate in and create social change in your life.

Grade: 4

Time Requirement: 160 minutes; however, this could be extended to a larger project

Objectives

Students will be able to:

• Read a variety of texts for information, understanding and determining importance with evidence from the text.
• Build and use new vocabulary.
• Draw conclusions and formulate opinions about causes, injustices and social justice.
• Democratically vote for a common purpose.
• Write responsive, reflective journal entries.
• Make connections to current issues in their lives and identify problems they want to change.
• Participate in whole class and in small groups.
• Create a project that represents a current social issue they would like to change and produce an action Web.
• Demonstrate empathy for others and an understanding for different points of view and experiences.
• Communicate Robert F. Kennedy's vision of a stronger community through individual actions.

New York State Learning Standards

• Social Studies Standard 4: Economics KI 1, PI 5
• Social Studies Standard 5: Civics, Citizenship and Government KI 1, PI 1; KI 2, PI 2; KI 3, PI2-3, KI 4, PI 1-2, 6
• English Language Arts Standard 1 Grade 4 - information and understanding: Reading PI 1-5;, 10, 12; Writing PI 1-5; Listening PI 1-4; Speaking PI2, 6-7
• English Language Arts Standard 3 Grade 4 - critical analysis and evaluation: Reading PI 1, 3, 7; Writing PI 1-4; Listening PI 1, 3; Speaking PI 3-4
• English Language Arts Standard 4 Grade 4 - social interaction: Reading PI 1, 3; Writing PI 1-3, 6-7, 9; Listening 2; Speaking PI 3
• The Arts Standard 3 Music PI 4-5; Visual Arts PI 3-4

SOCIAL STUDIES CORE CURRICULUM

• Grade 4: Local History and Local Government
• Local and State governments - The meaning of key terms and concepts related to government, including democracy, power and citizenship

SKILLS

• Thinking skills - Drawing inferences and making conclusions, evaluating
• Research and writing skills - Looking for patterns, analyzing information
• Interpersonal and group relations skills - Participating in group planning and discussion, cooperating to accomplish goals
• Image analysis skills - Decoding images, interpretation

CONCEPTS

• Change
• Choice
• Citizenship
• Human Rights
• Justice

Student Activities

Anticipatory Set

• What is meant by the quote from Mark Twain: "Actions speak louder than words."
• Write responses on the board, smartboard or overhead.

Activity 1

• "Today we are going to think about our role as citizens and what matters most to us. There is a quote I want you to read."
• The teacher gives each student the following quote by Martin Luther King Jr. as a reflective question: "It's always the right time to do the right thing." Students write or paste it into their social studies notebook.
• "Think about the way we live our lives today and how it relates to Robert F. Kennedy's message of hope and change."
• Students will quickly write down what they think it means. Students will swap books with the person beside them. Students will read their neighbor's thinking and respond. In their response, you can ask them to give an example that supports whether they agree or disagree.

Activity 2

Introduction: Speaking up and speaking out for social justice and change was played out in many ways during the 1960s. Songs of the time are primary sources that can help us understand what was happening then, how people were feeling and what they wanted people to know or to inspire. Let's look at a song from the 1960s and see what we can learn about people creating change against social injustice.

• Shared reading: Play and/or read this song (Song 5b) "If You Miss Me from the Back of the Bus" www.outreach.olemiss.edu/Freedom_Riders/Resources/IfYouMissMe.pdf  
• Additional songs from this time are available at: www.flint.lib.mi.us/powerofsong/script.shtml#2  (5c Power of Songs Web site)
• Children listen to, read and analyze a song of hope and change. Answer some or all of the questions either through discussion or journaling:
  • What is the author's purpose of the song? What was the message?
  • What types of changes are being sung about? What social issues were important then?
  • What does it tell you about change at the time it was written?
  • How does it relate to Robert F. Kennedy's message?

Optional: Each student creates a watercolor painting or drawing using symbols that represent the song, the struggle and the change.

Activity 3 - Thought questions: Jigsaw

We are going to think about these two questions:

• How have kids changed things in the world?
• What power do children have to change things?

Jigsaw Activity: Students will be broken into four groups. Within each group, each person will have a letter - A, B, C or D - that will be based on reading levels. They will then read the article and fill out the T chart of how children brought about change as individuals, as a group or as part of a movement. After, they will brainstorm their own ideas to add to the columns. (Worksheet 5d T-Chart, What Can I Do?)

• Whole class will meet to post ways that children helped bring about social change. Short discussion.
• Go back to your journal and add any new thinking to your quote page. Have your ideas of participation and taking action changed or grown? How and why? Explain.

Activity 4

Quote: "Be the change you want to see in the world." Mahatma Gandhi

How does this quote connect to the quote, "actions speak louder than words?" Have students talk in partnerships. Students will then come together in a whole class circle discussion about the connections and conclusions they made.

The way people live their lives is an expression of who they are and what they believe. We have examined social change and have a list of ways people have participated to support a cause or social change. I want you to think next about these questions

DOWNLOAD: Worksheet 5e: What is important to you? (PDF)

• What do you care about? What is important to you?
• What do you want to change?
• What makes you angry? What bothers you?
• What do you stand for?
• What are you willing to do or to give up to make it happen?
• Reflect on why.

Students write in their journal listing. Turn and talk to a partner. Identify things that you both had in common. Then the whole class will get together to share. Teacher posts responses. Checks are put next to issues that repeat.

The class will democratically vote on the issue they want to take on. They will fill out a graphic organizer the same as in Lesson 3.

• DOWNLOAD: Worksheet 5f :What it is / What it isn't (same as 3e)

Next, using the graphic organizer, the class will write an action plan to be put up on the board. This may take up to a whole class period. Discuss and split the class into groups.

• DOWNLOAD: Worksheet 5g: Action Web (PDF)

Extension:

• Letters to the new president: writing to make a difference.
  • What did Robert F. Kennedy's message mean to you?
  • What do you want the new president to address and change for the future?
  • Write a persuasive letter convincing the president to believe in your cause.
• Venn diagram social issues important to Robert F. Kennedy during his life and compare them to the social issues that we face today.
• What if Robert F. Kennedy were alive today?
  • Would his causes be different?
  • What would you do?
• Start a student council, create a safety patrol, create a school store, hold a fundraiser.
• Have students create a symbol and possibly a slogan that will represent their cause. Create a bulletin board with the symbols. Have the students trace their hands on different color construction paper and write their vision on them for use as a border.
• Develop an advertising campaign to build awareness (posters, buttons, chant).
• Organize an assembly with several components (song, PowerPoint).
• Fund raise, form a club, team, clothes/food drive.
• Write letters as a class to a politician.

Sen. Robert F. Kennedy (R) with Walter Wetzel, president of the National Congress of American Indians, and unidentified woman. (Photo by Francis Miller//Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)