About Me and You
Materials: basic art supplies
Time: 20 minutes or more
· Talk about individual differences
· Have students go around the room and say one thing they
like about themselves
· Next have them say one thing they like about their
neighbors
· Write an acrostic with their name using qualities they
like about themselves
We are All Important
Materials: Paper plates for each student, yarn cut
into 12 inch strips (tied onto paper plates in necklace
fashion) marker for each student
Time: 25 minutes
· Have students put plates around their neck and on their
back.
· Have each student go to each student and write
something they like about each person on their plate.
· After they are done allow them to read what was written
about them
· Display the plates (We are all very important
people)
What Could I Be
Materials: None
Time: 30 minutes
· Have the students think about occupations they think
would like to have when they grow up.
· Have them choose one and pantomime it in front of the
class.
· Let the students guess what they are pantomiming.
My Rules
Materials: Pencil and paper
Time: 15 minutes
· Have students make a list of rules that they would have
in their own house
· Have them tell their rules aloud and tell why they would
have them
Bookmarker
Materials: Cardstock, markers, crayons.
Time: 20 minutes
· Using one of the rules that we learned in class, the
students will create a bookmark that they can decorate and use. This
will help the students to remember the rules and the importance of
obedience to the rules.
Bad Habits
Materials: none
Time: 15 minutes
· Sit in a group and ask if anyone has a bad habit
· Go around group and have tell one of their bad habits and
a solution to get rid of it (if they want too)
Share with a Friend
Materials: Computer generated certificates with area to fill in
achievements
Time: 15 minutes in class, students own time
· Have students generate a list of helpers that have not
yet been mentioned in class such as janitors, lunch servers, bus
drivers, ect
· Tell students to observe these helpers this week and pick
one that they think is doing an especially good job.
· At the end of the week have the students choose a few
helpers that they want to award
· Teach them about specific praise and help them create a
certificate for the helpers of their choosing
Find someone who
Materials: worksheet with questions, pencils.
Time: 25 minutes
· The teacher will create a worksheet that has different
information questions on it.
· The students answer the questions, then they try to find
someone else in the classroom that has the same answer
Recognizing the Unspoken Helpers
Materials: each students innovation
Time: one week
· Have students share something with everyone in the class
during the next week
· It could be a picture, play time, book, lunch, whatever
they see fit.
What's Fair, What's not
Materials: Paper and Pencils for each student
· Have students keep track of fair acts that they notice at
home, school, and throughout the community.
Is it Fair?
Materials: Situations that the student can role-play, (have
several situations in which the characters can be fair or unfair)
Costumes or props appropriate for situations.
Time: 30 minutes
· Have the students act out several different open-ended
situations dealing with fairness (may have to leave the ending
off)
· Have the students determine what the best or fair thing
to do would be.
Discovering Community Helpers
Materials: Books about helpers in the community such as
policemen, firemen, paramedics
Time: 15 minutes
· Read books about community helpers aloud
· Draw a community helper
· Show picture and tell what their community helper does and why
they chose that one
Listening to Community Helpers
Materials: guest speakers
Time: your choice probably not longer than 30 minutes total
· Ask helpers from the community to come into the class and
talk to the students about what they do for the community. Be
sure to tell speaker date, time, time limit, subject, place, and age
group.
Respecting the Elderly
Materials: a pre planned program of music dealing with respect
and helping others
Time: one hour
· Discuss respect and how to learn about others
· Practice questions to ask residents
· Take a walking field trip to Sunshine Terrace (3
blocks).
· Present program to the residents
· Take time to mingle and talk to residents
Newspaper Clippings
Materials: Note to parents asking them to help
students with activity below
Time: 10 minutes every morning during the unit
· Have students cut out clippings of instances where the
law was disobeyed.
· Look at the clippings and discus the consequences of
disobeying the law in each instance.
Heros
Materials: Paper and basic art supplies.
Time: 15 minutes in class and students own time
· Have students draw a picture of own of their heros
· Have them find some information on their hero by word of
mouth from hero or acquaintance, magazine, television, book, ect
· Let the students share who there hero is, why they are
their hero, and some interesting things about their hero.
Puppet Show on Moral Dilemmas
Materials: paper bags, fabric, markers, crayons, other
odds and ends.
Time: 1 hour
· The students will make their own puppets of somebody that
is respected.
· Then they will get into groups of 3 or 4.
· They will then create a puppet show to display in front
of the class that role plays a situation where the use of respect
helped the situation.
Poem of Differences
Material: pencils, paper, crayons.
Time: 45 minutes
· The students will write a poem about respecting the
differences of others. This could be and takes place after
discussing what differences people may have.
· The teacher could also give the students the word
"respect" to use as the start of each sentence in the poem.
· The students could also draw a picture to go with their
poem after they are finished.
Thank you letters to Guest Speakers
Materials: paper, chalkboard, or big lined paper
Time: 30 minutes
· As a class, the students can compose a thank you letter
to send to the visitors that they had for the unit. This could
help the students practice being respectful to others.
Advertisement against drugs
Materials: basic art supplies
Time: 20 minutes
· In this activity, the students will create a
advertisement against disobedience to the law. The ad can deal
with stealing, drugs, or other legal offenses.
Paper Quilt
Materials: construction paper, magazine pictures, flags of
different countries, scissors, and glue
Time: 20-30 minutes
· When doing this activity, the students will create a
diversity quilt. Provide the students with pictures of
different cultures.
· The students will then be separated into groups.
Each group will create six different blocks.
· The teacher will then find the flags of different
countries to put in between the blocks that the students
created.
Collage
Materials: magazine pictures, newspapers, scissors, glue,
paper.
Time: 30 minutes
· In this activity, the students will be given some
magazines and newspapers.
· They then cut out pictures and words that represent
differences and similarities in cultures.
· After the students are finished with their collages, they
can share them within small groups to explain why they put the
pictures and the words on that they did.
Rewrite an ending to a story (refer to children's
literature section)
Materials: paper, pencils, anticipation guide worksheet.
Time: 40 minutes
· The students will do an anticipation guide for one of the
stories that the teacher is going to read.
· They will then from that guide create their own ending to
the story based on what they thought should have happened.
Celebrity Profile
Materials: information on various respected people
throughout history, papers, pencils. Time: 1 hour
· When doing this unit, the teacher should help the
students find people who possess the qualities being taught.
· The teacher should have some information on different
people who are respected (be sure reading material is on students'
reading level).
· The students could then write up a celebrity profile on
the different people and then share it with the class.
Cultural Dance
Materials: vary on which toys they decide to make.
Time: 30 minutes
· To help the students gain an understanding of
differences, the students could do dances from different cultures
such as the Mexican Hat Dance or The Hora.
Cultural Toys
Materials: will vary depending on which toy you decide
to make.
Time: 30 minutes
· The children could learn to how make toys from other
countries to see the differences. Some of the ideas are
cornhusk dolls, origami, achi boards, or mankala boards.
Jigsaw puzzle
Materials: cut out pieces of cardboard in the shape of
puzzle pieces.
Time: 30 minutes
· Each of the students in class is given a puzzle piece in
which they draw a picture or write something which helps represent
them.
· The students then put the pieces into a bowl. Each
child then pulls out a piece that is not their own
piece.
· The students then have to try and find the person that
the piece belongs to.
· When they find each other, the students explain why that
piece defines them.
Mobile
Materials: construction paper, pictures, crayons, markers,
glue.
Time: 30 minutes
· For this activity, the students will create a mobile the
represents themselves.
· The students will draw five pictures of what they like
the best about themselves.
· They will then assemble a mobile that will be displayed
for other children to see and find out about each
other.
Turn-to-Think
Materials: a deck of cards with moral dilemmas, a deck of
cards with numbers.
Time: 30 minutes
· The students will be split up into groups. Each
group will be given two decks of cards. One deck with moral
dilemmas and the other deck with numbers.
· The members of the groups will number off.
· They then draw a card from the deck with the
dilemmas. Everybody should think about an answer.
· Then, they draw from the deck of numbers and whichever
member's number corresponds with the number on the card answers the
dilemma.
· Discuss the answers as a class.
Nursing Home Presentation:
The students could visit a near-by nursing home where they
could put on a musical program for the elderly people. They
could also have about 15 minutes to interview people and ask them
questions about themselves (with the hope that understanding a few
things about these people might help them gain respect for people in
similar circumstances). The students could then return to the
classroom and create a mural of what they liked about the people they
met there. This would be a great shared writing or drawing
activity. When the mural is completed, the students could
actually give the poster to the residents at the nursing home.
Respecting the Community:
The students could walk the sidewalks in a ½ mile radius around
the school picking up garbage, and raking leaves for some of the
school's neighbors (prearrange which houses to rake leaves at).
A discussion of respect for the community in which they live in and
the land they live on could precede this activity. They could
also look for other community service opportunities as they are out
cleaning that they might be able to do on their own to better the
community. Once the class has returned to the school, the
teacher could start a brainstorming session on what future plans the
students have for helping the community on their own or as a group.
Also include a debriefing of the cleaning-up
experience.