Missouri Department of Elementary
The Many Roles I Play in My Community
Small groups brainstorm their roles in the community. Then, individually, complete a community roles web worksheet. Peers share their completed product and extend the conversation to include the feelings and character traits that go...
Just Health Action
What Makes a Community Healthy?
Young people have an opportunity to make it a beautiful day in their neighborhoods with an activity that asks them to identify what is healthy and unhealthy in their community and develop some ideas about what they can do to fix the...
Pace University
Community Helpers
Differentiate instruction with a unit focused on community helpers. A pre-assessment levels scholars into three groups. Learning contracts offer participants the choice of activities to complete and show what they know about specific...
Our White House
The Our White House Inauguration Celebration Kit for Kids!
Get the youngest American citizens involved in the presidential election and inauguration with a set of social studies activities. Focusing on the history of presidential inauguration ceremonies, learners draft their own poems, design...
Missouri Department of Elementary
An Apple a Day
Three apples—green, red, and rotten—exemplify character traits, negative and positive. Following a discussion about the classroom community, scholars complete an apple-themed worksheet that challenges them to read each trait, color it...
Missouri Department of Elementary
I’m A Star!
A lesson plan encourages scholars to be star community members. Pupils take part in a class discussion that challenges them to brainstorm at least two ways to show responsibility within one's community. Small groups play a game in which...
Advocates for Youth
What Does Community Mean to Me?
Having a strong and supportive community is key for adolescent success. Teenagers explore the circles of their own communities, including the rights and responsibilities of being in their families, peer relationships, and their country,...
Curated OER
The Women’s Suffrage Movement
A set of lessons about the women's suffrage movement will bring history to life for your middle schoolers. Learners study primary documents, learn about famous suffragettes, and compare the suffrage movement to current events...
Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund
Hometown Heroes
Transform studying about veterans in a textbook to personal interviews with veterans in the community. Four varying lesson plans make up an entire unit or individualized learning based on your class's needs. Exercises include researching...
iCivics
Step Nine: Action Campaign
It's time to take action! Learners strategize their action campaigns by using the resource and past brainstorming activities from the series that help them pinpoint problems in their communities. They use included templates to get the...
Missouri Department of Elementary
Fly Your Kite
Encourage scholars to become a productive community member with a kite-themed lesson. Following a review and discussion, learners complete a Venn diagram that displays the connection between character traits needed to make a home and...
Missouri Department of Elementary
What Color is Your Apple?
Build your classroom community with an activity that uses apples to examine oneself and their classmates. Participants draw four large apples on blank paper then exchange them within a small group. Group members write a character trait...
City University of New York
Jim Crow and the Fight for Civil Rights
The history of voting rights in America has always been rocky, especially in the time period after the Civil War. Learn about the ways that Jim Crow laws affected the voting rights of African Americans with a lesson featuring primary...
Missouri Department of Elementary
Are You Balanced?
Balance scales create a strong visual of how an individual prioritizes one's self alongside their commitments to the community, school, and home. Scholars complete a graphic organizer then discuss their findings with their peers. A...
Missouri Department of Elementary
Keep Finding the Positive
Group members take on roles to create a positive classroom community. Learners perform their role—leader, recorder, presenter, timekeeper, encourager, and collector—in preparation for a formal presentation of their positive thinking...
Missouri Department of Elementary
Juggling New Opportunities
Life is like trying to juggle three tennis balls! That's the big idea in a lesson that asks freshmen to consider that sometimes juggling the areas of their lives (social/emotion, academic, and career) runs smoothly and sometimes not so...
Peace Corps
Introducing Culture
Growing up within a culture leaves a lot of ideas and values unspoken. Take a closer look at the cultures in which your learners live with a discussion activity that addresses cultural identity and traits of those living within the...
Advocates for Youth
What Are My Personal, Family and Community Values
What are your values? Where did you learn them? How are they reflected in your everyday life? Middle and high schoolers reflect on their personal and community values with a variety of group activities.
Dream of a Nation
Creating Awareness through Action Oriented Writing and Research
Middle schoolers aren't too young to feel strongly about politics, social issues, consumer rights, or environmental problems. Demonstrate the first steps toward social change with a project about action-oriented writing. Eighth graders...
City University of New York
Urban Politics: Machines and Reformers
Take a trip to the turn of the twentieth century with a resource about industrialism in America. With primary source documents and focus questions, learners think about the ways that government groups and organizations paved the way for...
City University of New York
Women's Suffrage and World War I
Democracy cannot exist where not everyone has equal rights. Discuss the state of democracy and women's suffrage during World War I with class discussions, debates, and primary source analysis, in order for class members to connect with...
City University of New York
Electoral College
A presidential election is a lot like the 2004 World Series, and it's also a lot like choosing an orange in a paper bag. Apply the process of the electoral college to these two analogies with a set of lessons about government...
Missouri Department of Elementary
Other Changes (Life-Changing Events Outside of the Family)
Change is inevitable. Kindergarteners discuss coping skills to properly manage changes that can occur outside the family. Scholars reflect on their life changes after starting kindergarten. They discuss their feelings and draw a...
Diane Venzera
Kwanzaa Celebration: Celebrating Family, Community, and Culture
Kwanzaa is the focus of a three-part lesson that celebrates the history and traditions of the holiday. Before lighting the Kinara, scholars listen to a read-aloud of Seven Candles of Kwanzaa by Andrea Davis Pinkney. Learners express...