A Priest, a Rabbi, and a Buddhist Walk Into a…

For the past several years, the intermediate public school in my town has hosted a World Religions Day for the 6^th graders. For an entire day, sixth grade classes move with their teachers from classroom to classroom every 40 minutes or so to learn about different religions and cultures. Each presentation is led by either a local religious leader or a practicing member (usually a parent) of a particular faith. There is absolutely no proselytizing, “recruitment” efforts, or one-upmanship regarding the speakers’ personal faiths in relation to other faiths. Rather, the sessions are warm, informational, and meant to educate the students on the various religions in our region. The presentations highlight the commonalities and differences among various religions, as well as the history and cultural influences behind each respective religion’s specific beliefs. Students are strongly encouraged to ask questions, and after a few brief moments of hesitation, a barrage of questions invariably flows from the kids. Parents and town residents are welcome to attend the sessions, and a healthy number do. This past year, sessions were hosted by a Catholic priest, a rabbi, a Buddhist monk, a Presbyterian minister, a Congregational pastor, an imam, and a parent who practices Hinduism. Follow-up surveys to the students indicate that the overwhelming majority find the experience interesting and valuable (much to their surprise). They appreciate the exposure to the religions of some of their peers, and the opportunity to ask questions that they normally would be too embarrassed or too shy to ask in another environment. Against some fairly substantial odds, the event has been a success each year.

The topic of religion in public schools has a long and highly controversial history in the United States, and remains the cause of much conflict. Religion is certainly a “hot button” subject in many regions, and many schools understandably decide to distance themselves from the topic as much as possible. There are fears of possible indoctrination, the belief that any mention of religion in public school is unconstitutional, and the concern that introducing discussion about religion in the classroom could provoke clashes between students of different faiths. Some schools, however, have decided to tackle the subject head-on by incorporating lessons about world religions into the curriculum.

Some decades ago, schools adopted materials on multiculturalism and diversity education in order to foster better student understanding of racial and cultural differences, and to promote tolerance. Lessons on world religions may be viewed in a similar vein, with many of the same goals. By law, public schools in the U.S. may not provide religious instruction, but they may teach about religion. There’s a vital difference, and it’s critical to distinguish between teaching religion, and teaching about religion. Teachers and outside guests must remain neutral when teaching about religion in public schools, and embrace the idea that at its heart, education is about broadening students’ horizons, and teaching them to develop the necessary critical thinking and reasoning skills that will prepare them for a thoughtful and well-informed life ahead.

My picks this week focus on lessons that teach students about various world religions and how they influence the local and global cultures. I will also be featuring many more lessons and educational resources on world religions on our Facebook and Twitter pages, so be sure to give those a look.

The Golden Rule of Reciprocity

http://www.thegateway.org/browse/dcrecord.2010-09-03.5099174322

Subjects: World Religions, Social Studies, English Language Arts

Grade: 4-6

The Silk Roads encompassed a diversity of cultures embracing numerous religions and worldviews from Venice, Italy to Heian, Japan. Between these two ends, belief systems that are represented are Buddhism, Confucianism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Shinto, and Daoism. In this lesson, students will review, compare and contrast The Golden Rule of Reciprocity from different religious teachings, and will analyze primary texts of sacred and philosophical writings. This lesson was produced by the Asia Society, a global non-profit organization that seeks to strengthen relationships and promote education in the fields of arts and culture, policy and business in the U.S. and Asia.

Five Major World Religions

http://www.thegateway.org/browse/dcrecord.2011-07-07.2899234832

Subjects: World Religions, Research Skills

Grade: 7

This activity allows students to research and identify various aspects of five major world religions including Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Judaism. Students will use the World Wide Web to conduct research, recording their findings in tables. This lesson is a product of C·R·E·A·T·E for Mississippi at Mississippi State University. C·R·E·A·T·E for Mississippi provides on-site, on-going technology professional development, "just-in-time" support for technology use, and technology-infused curriculum modules.

An Approach to Teaching Religious Tolerance http://www.thegateway.org/browse/dcrecord.2011-07-07.6359379322

Subjects: World Religions, Social Studies, English, Character Education

Grade: 9-12

The United States of America is a nation founded upon freedom. Our Founding Fathers attempted to frame a flexible document to live through the ages which would protect and promote freedom. It is the responsibility of the people in a democratic society to educate their children to understand our freedom, but also the responsibility that goes with it. The primary focus of this lesson will be that of religious freedom. It is a sensitive subject area, but a critical one to developing an understanding of our rights as United States citizens. Students should learn to be open-minded, independent thinkers in this area so that freedom may be guaranteed throughout the ages. This lesson is a product of the Academy Curricular Exchange at the Organization for Community Networks (OFCN). The Curriculum Exchange offers a variety of lesson plans by teachers attending the Columbia Education Center's Summer Workshops, as well teachers nationwide.

~Joann's Picks - July 21, 2011~

Unwrapping the Gift(ed)

There is nothing more unequal than the equal treatment of unequal people
-- Thomas Jefferson

There are many hot button issues in education, but one of the most controversial topics is gifted education. Defining “giftedness,” and what to do with gifted students, is often a highly politicized and polarizing process. Education experts often disagree on how to appropriately measure giftedness in students, and those who push for gifted and talented programs in schools are often charged with elitism. Gifted education is not mandated in many states, so those school districts are not required to budget for it. As a result, gifted students are often overlooked; since they are “excelling” in their current programs, they are frequently left to shift for themselves, essentially ignored while human and fiscal resources are diverted elsewhere.

The idea that gifted students need less teaching and school resources is pervasive in American society. Parents and educators who lobby for the creation of gifted and talented programs generally receive little sympathy or support from the parents of non-gifted students, as well as from educators who already face tight school budgets. Yet the problems inherent in under-challenging students are of equal importance to the problems faced by special needs students who require additional support and resources in order to learn the curriculum. Students who are under-challenged in school often exhibit the same behaviors as students who are struggling academically – they become bored, lose interest in school, and may exhibit signs of depression and behavioral problems. Gifted students, because they are academically advanced, are also frequently assumed to be advanced in all areas. Instead, gifted students may struggle socially, desperately wanting to bond with classmates, but often rebuffed because they are perceived as “geeks.” Gifted students can also exhibit an inability to communicate at grade level, causing further isolation from their peers.

Schools that don’t offer formal TAG programs sometimes offer modified work, extra work, or enrichment classes for their gifted students. Teachers can provide modified assignments and/or challenge problems and assignments for their high-level students (or all students), and some schools offer more formalized programs, such as Math Olympiad, Odyssey of the Mind, science fairs, and the like. While enrichment programs sometimes receive criticism for requiring gifted students to do extra work rather than the same amount of work at a higher level, such programs can still fill a gap if the school does not offer other options for gifted kids. If a school allows, gifted students can also engage in independent study programs, or learning sessions comprised of other high-ability classmates with similar interests.

Most public school teachers will experience the pleasures and the challenges of both special needs students and gifted students at some point in their careers, and often in the same class. It’s extremely difficult to meet the needs of all students in a heterogeneous classroom, especially without teaching aides. But teachers should resist, as much as humanly possible, the temptation to just teach to the middle, and leaving both high-achieving students and those who need more support floundering at the periphery. Creating a repository of challenge problems and assignments that require higher-thinking skills ahead of time can help address the gifted students, and keep them engaged and challenged in class. This week I’m featuring three resources written specifically for gifted and talented students. Please be sure to check out our Facebook and Twitter pages as well, as I’ll be featuring several new lessons, activities, and other resources on gifted education each day for the next week.


Not Just for Gods and Goddesses: Greece Enrichment http://www.thegateway.org/browse/dcrecord.2011-04-15.7494003533
Subjects: Language Arts, Geography,
Grade: 2 Gifted
This unit is designed as an extension of a second grade Ancient Greece theme. The students will learn vocabulary using the alphabet and words of Greek origin, enrich their research and creative writing skills, create topographical cookie maps and perform original theatrical monologues. This lesson was produced by the CoreKnowledge Foundation, an independent, nonprofit, and nonpartisan organization that publishes educational books and materials for educators.

The “T” in Art is for Thinking
http://www.thegateway.org/browse/dcrecord.2008-08-03.4431907119/
Subjects: Visual Art, Research skills
Grade: 4-8 Gifted
This lesson provides fourth through eighth grade gifted and talented students with a research-based project, and can also be used with art and language arts students from sixth through ninth grade. Students will design and create a slideshow presentation as a vehicle for analyzing a painting. Using the art criticism process, students will describe and analyze the art elements and principles of design and provide an interpretation of a painting of their choice. Biographical information about the artist and contextual knowledge concerning the art period/movement and the associated historical times may be included. This lesson is a product of ALEX, the Alabama Learning Exchange, which is an education portal that provides lesson plans, best practices, and Alabama professional development activities. This lesson is aligned to Alabama state content standards.


To Be Or Not to Be: A Lesson Plan Written for Peter L. Fischl's Poster Poem:
"To the Little Polish Boy Standing with His Arms Up" http://www.thegateway.org/browse/dcrecord.2011-04-17.8686513498
Subjects: English, Research skills
Grade: 9-12 Gifted
In this lesson, students will read, analyze, and discuss the poem “To the Little Polish Boy Standing With His Arms Up” by Peter L. Fischl. Some topics of the lesson include identifying victims, bystanders, and perpetrators in the poem, analyzing the author’s use of music, painting, sculpture, and repetition in the poem, and to speculate about the author’s desire for revenge. This lesson is offered by the Holocaust Teacher Resource Center, an organization which strives to combat prejudice and bigotry by transforming the horrors of the Holocaust into positive lessons. This site is sponsored by the Holocaust Education Foundation, Inc.

~Joann's Picks - 4/29/2011~

James and the Giant Speech

When I was in fifth grade, my class had to orally present book projects to our classmates – and worse – the sixth grade class as well. This was really our first foray into delivering oral presentations, and it was nerve-wracking. We sat on the gym floor and nervously waited and watched as one by one we fidgeted and mumbled our way through our presentations, trying to ignore the smirks and stares from the sixth graders. I especially remember one boy, who was so nervous about presenting his favorite book, James and the Giant Peach, that he talked way too fast and repeatedly referred to it as “James and the Giant Speech.” While it was funny at the time, I think it aptly illustrates how stressful oral presentations can be.

Every few years, a well-publicized list of the top fears cited by the public is touted on various media outlets. Public speaking nearly always tops the list, followed by lesser fears such as the fear of heights, illness, flying, and even death. An old episode of Seinfeld once had Jerry point out that, since the fear of public speaking outweighs the fear of death for most people, the people delivering eulogies at funerals would apparently prefer to be in the casket, dead, rather than be speaking about the deceased.

Things on the public speaking front have vastly improved since I was in elementary school. Starting in preschool and kindergarten, students are prompted to publicly share weekend news and items of interest through show and tell or sharing times. Students at many schools also regularly take turns in reading the morning announcements, and many K-12 class projects now include a public presentation component. The goal is clear: If students can become comfortable with public speaking at a young age, they are less likely to experience anxiety when presenting or speaking up in class in the future. The benefits of being at ease when speaking in public are many. Teachers cite increased student self-esteem and confidence, as well as the ability to demonstrate leadership, critical thinking, and preparation skills.

There are many ways to incorporate public speaking into the curriculum through the use of plays, classroom skits, role-playing, reviews, debates, the sharing of current events, science experiment debriefings, and other ideas. For homeschooled students, opportunities for public speaking can present more of a challenge. In such cases, local or regional homeschool groups can meet for student debates and presentations. If homeschool groups aren’t available, many students find opportunities for public speaking through their local churches or other places of worship (weekly readings, etc.), community theater, leading book discussions at the local library, and other ideas.

My picks this week offer resources on incorporating public speaking into the curriculum and honing student public speaking skills. As always, I’ll be featuring many additional lessons, activities, and other resources on public speaking throughout the week on our Facebook and Twitter pages. Peggy and I are also interested to hear from you regarding what types of lessons you’d like to see featured in our columns here on The Gateway. Don’t be shy – drop us a note on our Facebook, Twitter, or blog pages and let us know.


Daily Book Boosts
http://www.thegateway.org/viewFullButton.gif
Subjects: English Language Arts, Public Speaking
Grade: 3-5
Each day at the end of their independent reading time, students give Book Boosts, which are one-minute raves about books they've read. These Book Boosts are easy ways to suggest a multitude of titles to students, and they act as a way for students to have something to think about as they read. It’s also a great way to get students used to getting up and speaking in front of their peers. This activity is a product of ReadWriteThink, which offers free reading and language arts lesson plans. Each lesson is peer-reviewed by teachers and members of the International Reading Association (IRA) and the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE). This lesson is aligned to NCTE/IRA Content Standards.


Impromptu Speeches
http://www.thegateway.org/browse/dcrecord.2011-04-04.7841259439
Subjects: English, Public Speaking
Grade: 9-12
An impromptu speech is delivered without preparation or thought ahead of time. In this lesson, students will hone their quick-thinking skills as they formulate an impromptu speech about a given topic. This lesson was produced by Scholastic, publishers of trade books and educational titles, as well as lessons, teaching resources, and other products.


How to Teach Students to Present an Oral Report
http://www.thegateway.org/browse/dcrecord.2011-04-04.7419507271
Subjects: English Language Arts, Public Speaking, Research Skills
Grade: 6
In this lesson, students will recognize how to research and present an oral report. Students learn about ways to capture their audience’s attention, report organization, and ways to support their main points. This lesson is offered by Hot Chalk, a free online learning management system designed specifically for K-12 educators. Hot Chalk also offers free lesson plans and educational activities for teachers and students.

~Joann's Picks - 4/22/2011~

Keeping the Stories Alive: Studying the Holocaust

There are 350,000 survivors of the Holocaust alive today...
There are 350,000 experts who just want to be useful with the remainder of their lives. Please listen to the words and the echoes and the ghosts. And please teach this in your schools.
--Steven Spielberg (Academy Award acceptance speech)

I was very lucky to be able to visit the United States Holocaust Museum during a trip I took to Washington D.C. during high school. The visit made a huge impact on me, since it put real faces and voices with the events I had read about in books like The Diary of Anne Frank. These weren’t long-dead historical figures, and some of them are still alive today to tell their story. History standards often emphasize the importance of allowing students to draw learning from primary sources, which are readily available for the subject of the Holocaust. You might not be able to take your students to Washington D.C. and you might not be able to bring a Holocaust survivor into your school for a presentation, but there are plenty of recordings, pictures, interviews, and other interactive resources you can use in your class to create a virtual field trip or presentation. According to the Florida Center for Instructional Technology’s Holocaust teacher’s guide, “Personal accounts by survivors of the Holocaust are powerful. They connect us, person to person, with an era in history that is difficult, yet necessary, to comprehend. Survivor testimony translates the countless unimaginable victims into a single person's feelings and thoughts.”

Why should you include the study of the horrible events of the Holocaust in your classroom? Besides the fact that it is an important chapter of history, the study of these events will teach your students real-life lessons about humanity. It will also contribute to one of the main goals of education, which is to create responsible citizens. These are real events that happened to real people, some of who are alive today. Students may be able to relate to these people and their stories and empathize with their situation. According to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, studying the Holocaust piques student interest because it raises questions of the issues that adolescents are facing every day in their lives. These issues include “fairness, justice, individual identity, peer pressure, conformity, indifference, and obedience.”

To learn more about how to best tackle the subject of the Holocaust, please visit the education section of the museum’s site. http://www.thegateway.org/browse/33097 They have guidelines for teaching, important subjects to cover, and a comprehensive online museum about the Holocaust. The site also has resources and lesson plans. Their Holocaust Encyclopedia includes first-hand information about many of the victims.

The Florida Center for Instructional Technology has also put together an excellent collection of resources for teaching about the Holocaust in different grade levels. These resources have been catalogued on the Gateway so you can easily find them. The following link will take you to their main page: http://www.thegateway.org/browse/26064. As you browse through the site you will find many sections of teaching material. There are sections dedicated to the people involved in the Holocaust, the arts during the time, and a collection of web-based resources for teachers.

If you search for Holocaust on The Gateway, you will find plenty more resources to complement the collections of tools, primary sources, and other resources I highlighted above. Also, be sure to look at the resources Joann featured in her column. There were some wonderful ideas that you can use. I do suggest reading the guidelines for teaching on the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum first. It won’t take a lot of time, and it will help you understand how to best reach your students when tackling this difficult subject. The survivors of the Holocaust are aging. Each generation of students studying the subject has fewer resources than the last, so it is up to educators to keep the stories and lessons learned alive.

~Peggy's Corner - 4/15/2011~

Never to Forget

For the past several years, a survivor of the Holocaust has made an annual trip to our intermediate and middle schools to speak about his experience at Auschwitz. It’s an intensely powerful and moving experience for our sixth, seventh, and eighth graders, and it’s meant to be. The presenter – now 90 years old – has told his story so often that he’s able to describe life under the Nazi regime and at Auschwitz quietly and without much emotion. The students, however, sometimes gasp, sob, or seek the comforting hand of a classmate beside them. Though the details of events at the death camp are often difficult for the students to hear, they are ultimately grateful for the experience, and many cite it as one of the most profound events they’ve ever attended.

Information about the Holocaust – the systematic slaughter of millions of Jews, gypsies, Poles, Soviets, gays, people with disabilities, and those resistant to supporting Nazi Germany’s policies – is often first received by students as something akin to the plot of a bad horror novel. Their initial reaction to first learning of the Final Solution is often disbelief. The sheer magnitude of the atrocities, and the barbarism with which they were committed, is unthinkable. Yet the unthinkable did occur, and one of the many legacies left by the Holocaust is that we are bound by our humanity to fight hatred and stop atrocities. All humans deserve the right to live their lives in dignity and peace, and the Holocaust has illustrated only too well what can happen when that fundamental right is challenged. The lessons posed by the Holocaust offer a broad range of learning opportunities across the curriculum, from world history, literature, religion, and science, to psychology, character education, social responsibility, and other areas. The possibilities are limitless.

This year, Holocaust Remembrance Day will be observed on May 1. It’s a time to remember the victims, honor the courage of those who resisted the madness, and reflect on ways to end bigotry and intolerance. The lessons learned from the Holocaust must never be forgotten, especially as current genocides, such as that in Darfur, continue to plague the world. This week, I’m highlighting three Holocaust resources from The Gateway that are age appropriate and that can be used across the curriculum. As always, we’ll be featuring many additional lessons, activities, and other Holocaust-related resources throughout the week on our Facebook and Twitter pages. Please be sure to check those pages regularly, as we feature new resources 2-3 times each day.


The Diary of Anne Frank: Teacher’s Guide
http://www.thegateway.org/browse/dcrecord.2011-04-04.2123000836
Subjects: English, World history
Grade: 7-12
This guide encourages students to regard Anne Frank's diary as both an historical document and a literary work. It is intended to provide middle school and high school teachers with strategies and materials that support classroom viewing and discussion of The Diary of Anne Frank, based on new information about Anne’s family, life, and death. Discussion questions, activities, reproducible worksheets, and assignment ideas are supplemented by an extensive listing of resources for further exploration. This resource was written in support of the 2010 PBS Masterpiece film adaptation of Frank's diary, addressing historical context, revised diary passages, and exploring the diary form. This resource was created by WGBH, the Boston PBS affiliate. WGBH is PBS’s single largest producer of educational TV programs and Internet content, and offers scores of lesson plans and other materials for classroom and home use.


Investigating the Holocaust: A Collaborative Inquiry Project http://www.thegateway.org/browse/dcrecord.2009-11-12.1060171012
Subjects: English Language Arts, World history, Research skills
Grade: 6-8
As students progress though this inquiry project, they explore a variety of resource texts, images, sounds, photos, and other artifacts as they learn about the Holocaust. Working collaboratively, they investigate the materials, prepare response to share orally with the class, and produce a topic-based newspaper to complete their research. This lesson was produced by ReadWriteThink, which offers free peer-reviewed lesson plans aligned to NCTE/IRA content standards.


A Holocaust Monument
http://www.thegateway.org/browse/dcrecord.2011-04-06.7930828927
Subjects: Math/Geometry, World history, Architecture
Grade: 3-12
In this activity students use geometric shapes or forms to create a Holocaust monument. The lesson is appropriate after students have studied the Holocaust enough that they are ready to express some personal response to what they have learned. The activity is provided at three levels of increasing complexity. Level one uses simple shapes and is appropriate for elementary grades, level two utilizes three dimensional forms, and level three assumes that the students have some understanding of architecture. This activity is the product of the Florida Center of Technology (FCIT) at the University of South Florida’s College of Education. FCIT works with educators to integrate technology into the curriculum, and provides training opportunities as well as lesson plans and educational activities.

~Joann's Picks - 4/15/2011~

Just Wild About Harry

It’s been nearly 14 years since the publication of the first Harry Potter book. The first generation of Potter fans has now likely completed college, having grown up alongside the books’ protagonists that they’ve grown to love. Although sales of the Harry Potter series have slowed since the publication of the final book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, in 2007, a new crop of readers continue to discover the series each year. According to Scholastic, the American publisher of the Harry Potter series, there are currently 143 million copies of Potter books in print in the U.S., and 400 million copies worldwide. Kids in high school and middle school still tell me on a fairly regular basis that they are trying to wean themselves off the series, and ask for alternative book recommendations. If my town is a literary barometer of any kind, then the series is still in brisk demand: our public and school libraries regularly replace existing copies of the Potter series, due to constant use.

One of the beauties of the Potter books is that they speak to students without moralizing or condescension. There are many themes running throughout the series, but the ones that seem to resonate the most with students include power, survival, fitting in, good versus evil, and oppression. These themes reflect what many students – in the throes of adolescence – experience daily in their own lives to some degree. Students are naturally interested in situations that they can relate to, and are likely to be more vested in lessons where they feel some emotional or intellectual connection. While using the books in English Language Arts classes is a natural choice, there’s no reason to limit the use of the novels exclusively to these classrooms. Introducing Harry Potter-themed lessons across the curriculum can be a fun and interesting way to interject something unexpected in a seemingly straightforward lesson, and perhaps invigorate some of the topics that students often find less than interesting.

My picks this week all make innovative use of Harry Potter characters and events across the curriculum. I’ll be featuring many more Harry Potter-themed lessons, activities, and other resources for a variety of ages and subjects throughout the week on our Facebook and Twitter pages, so please be sure to visit those pages regularly. Lots of great ideas, and no wands necessary.

Harry Potter Math Stories
http://www.thegateway.org/browse/dcrecord.2011-02-27.7159760155
Subjects: Math
Grade: 1-3
These addition and simple multiplication word problems use characters and situations from the Harry Potter novels. An answer sheet is provided. This resource was produced by MathStories, a math site devoted to helping students in grades 1-6 boost their math critical thinking and problem-solving skills.

Introduction to Primary and Secondary Sources
http://www.thegateway.org/browse/32048
Subject: Research skills
Grade: 4-8
What if you had the scrap of paper on which J.K. Rowling wrote the beginnings of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone? In this lesson, students pretend that they are doing research for a biography of the author J.K. Rowling. They will examine examples of sources of information and decide which are primary sources and which are secondary sources. This will give students an introduction to primary and secondary sources in a familiar context, and prepare them for further study. This lesson was published by Florida Memory, an online project of the State Library & Archives of Florida. In addition to lesson plans and other educational resources, the site also offers interactive exhibits, photo collections, and documents of Florida history.

Genetic Traits in Harry Potter
http://www.thegateway.org/browse/dcrecord.2011-02-27.7244414478
Subjects: Biology, Life Science
Grade: 7-11
In this lesson, students review or learn genetic terms and concepts, such as DNA, chromosome, gene, allele, homozygous, heterozygous, recessive and dominant genes, genotype, phenotype, complex traits, Mendelian inheritance, and Punnett Square; and apply them in identifying possible inheritance patterns and genotypes of magical ability demonstrated by several characters in the Harry Potter series. This lesson was produced by the U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM) at the National Institutes of Health. NLM is the world’s largest medical library, and offers a plethora of materials, information, and research services in all areas of biomedicine and health care.

~Joann's Picks - 3/10/2011~