Martin Luther King Lesson

Just found this awesome idea for teaching about Martin Luther King and his message.  It's from Elementary School's Counselor Blog. The blog seems to be inactive since last spring, but she has some wonderful ideas that still work today and can be used.

This M & M lesson is very simple but very clear and powerful for young minds to understand the concept that we are all the same underneath the color of our skin.

The lesson actually begins with two wrapped presents.  One neat and pretty and the other poorly wrapped with old torn paper and tied with a string.  The students get to pick which one they would open.  As predicted, most of them pick the pretty one.  When they open it they find it is filled with rocks.  Then they open the other one and find M&M's.

You can start with the M&M's wrapped in the boxes or just skip the gift box part as time allows.  Either way it is a creative way to illustrate your point.

It is a great warm up to the MLK Art/Writing activity I created and have done the past couple years.

  

Are you ready for JANUARY!?

Start your New Year off in your classroom with this creative Art/Writing project about Martin Luther King, Jr.

Here are a couple great books to read to your primary classes to go along with the study of Martin Luther King's life, death and his legacy.

I love this series of historical books for my primary students.  My library has some of the titles, but I am growing my own collection as well.

A Picture Book of Martin Luther King, Jr. by David Adler

 Happy Birthday Martin Luther King by Jean Marzollo.  

Beautiful artwork in this one along with the story of his life.

Day 17 3rd Grade Gridiron

Here is the perfect blog for the big game this weekend...The 3rd Grade Gridiron.

I'm a 49ers fan...have been since moving to California from Florida as a kid.  (Before that I was a true blue Dolphins fan...my parents were even lucky enough to have Miami Dolphin season tickets during their "Perfect Season" -- I got to watch the game at home with my little sister and a babysitter -- oh well)

Now I live in North Idaho...and until this season, the Seahawks, being the closest team, have not been worth watching....we thought we were on track this year...but they lost last weekend...so now it's back to the Niners for us.

Now sitting down watching a football game doesn't happen for me.  I am not a good sitter.  I am a good stander and do-er.  I don't know if it's why I am a teacher or if it is from being a teacher, but I have the need to multi-task.  So I will probably be on my laptop looking for new blogs and ideas to pin and post.  But if you ask my boss...I'm working on my report cards...really....I am!

Dana's blog is from Atlanta.  A place I have been to one time...and that one time it snowed while I was there!  This week Dana has some great freebies for Martin Luther King Day...in case you are like me and haven't done that lesson yet, head over and get her free banner and puzzle pages to go with your lesson.

Martin Luther King Day Ideas

Here are some links to ideas to use when studying about Martin Luther King...

You have to start with a good book.  Here are a couple good ones I've used:

Martin's Big Words

A Picture Book of Martin Luther King, Jr

My First Biography: Martin Luther King, Jr

Then after you've read a good book or two to build schema...then you can move on to planning and plotting and writing and interpreting.

Here is a freebie I made...this is a sample of what the finished product could look like.  It is on my TpT store with the writing template.  Feel free to use it :)  Click HERE to download.

Here are some other teachers with some fun and clever ideas...plus some other sites too:

Classroom Freebies

Free coloring page on TeacherVision

Kinder Alphabet 

Flying into First Grade

This is a good video on Brain Pop (I had never found this site before.  It's cool!)

Crazy for First Grade

Check out this Fingerprint Peace Dove art project.  It's amazing!

Free Kids Crafts.com

Poem Freebie

Word Search

This site has a historical narrative for you to read if you are rusty on the details of Martin Luther King Jr's life.  

Well, that should get just about anybody started.  If you still haven't found what you need, then pop over to TpT and search for free Martin Luther King stuff.  There is quite a bit more on the site.