Back-to-School Activity: All About Me

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Subjects

-Reading
-Writing
-Art

Grade

K-3

Brief Description

Create a classroom book that shares the most important attributes of your students.

Objectives

Students will:

• Create a classroom book that shares their most important attributes.
• Describe how words and phrases (e.g., regular beats, alliteration, rhymes, repeated lines) supply rhythm and meaning in a story, poem or song.
• Identify details that support main ideas or key points. 
• Use illustrations and details to support/describe main ideas in a nonfiction text.

Keywords

Self-esteem, character development, individuality, unique, all about me, icebreaker, back to school

Materials Needed

• The Important Book by Margaret Wise Brown
• White paper (for student pages) and construction paper for the cover
• Markers or crayons
• Elmer’s® Disappearing Purple Glue Stick
• Digital camera (for cover photo)

Lesson Plan

The new school year can be filled with all kinds of different emotions -- anticipation, excitement and even fear of the unknown. Help ease those fears by giving students an opportunity to create a page in a classroom book that describes the most important things about them.

Begin by reading The Important Book by Margaret Wise Brown. Discuss the pattern of the text. For example, “The important thing about grass is that it is green. It grows, and is tender, with a sweet grassy smell. But the important thing about grass is that it is green.”

After reading the book, ask students to think of things that make each one of them important and unique. Provide each student with a graphic organizer to help him/her brainstorm and organize thoughts, and encourage students to add at least one quality, trait or skill to each box. Then, let the students complete the writing frame to complete the text for their page. This is a great way to ensure that even your struggling readers and writers are successful. After each student has complete his writing frame, he or she can easily create a page for the class book using any word-processing program. Remind students to leave room on the page for  adding their own artwork. Print the pages and give students time to illustrate them.

Take a photo of the class with a digital camera. Print the photo and glue it to a piece of construction paper for the cover. Then bind the pages into a class book titled The Most Important Things About Us.

Differentiation Ideas

With younger students, a few volunteers can help format the word documents so that the students can create their book pages. Older students really enjoy creating this page both electronically and with their own illustrations. If you are allowing them to create their own page design, remind them to think about what kind of illustration they want to include and plan for that with the copy on the page.

Assessment

Share the book with the class when it is finished. Discuss why it is so important that we recognize what makes each of us special. Some questions to guide the discussion might be:

• What makes you special?
• What does "unique" mean?
• What makes you important?
• How is important different from unique?

Lesson Plan Source

Cre8time, through partnership with EducationWorld

Submitted By

Elmer’s Teachers Club™
 

Common Core State Standards

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.CCRA.R.5 - Analyze the structure of texts, including how specific sentences, paragraphs, and larger portions of the text (e.g., a section, chapter, scene, or stanza) relate to each other and the whole.

CCSS.ELA-Literacy.CCRA.R.7 - Integrate and evaluate content presented in diverse media and formats, including visually and quantitatively, as well as in words.

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