Ethics and the Underground Railroad

When I first learned the story of Anne Frank I truly considered if I would help hide people myself. I know what was happening at that time was wrong. But the consequences of being caught doing so were extreme. When we learned about Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad, I asked my students the same question. My class this year is very loving, very thoughtful-most of them said yes, they would help.

We have been working on making an argument for our opinions so I asked them to also tell me why they felt that way.

I want everybody to be free. I want everybody to be loved.

because it is nice

It is not fair

Painting Jazz

I am a big believer in encouraging the Arts in our daily instruction. So for our writing activity, we listened to jazz music, painted what it made us visualize in our minds and then articulate that image in a sentence. So this is what jazz looks like. :) 

Kindergarten Blues

One of my favorite poets to use in the classroom is Langston Hughes! His poems are not too long for the attention spans of my Kinder students and they are as beautiful as they are meaningful.

I played some blues music for my students and then we read this poem by Hughes:

When the shoe strings break
On both your shoes
And you're in a hurry-
That's the blues.

When you go to buy a candy bar
And you've lost the dime you had-
Slipped through a hole in your pocket somewhere-
That's the blues, too, and bad!

Then I asked them to write about what "The Blues" looks like in Kindergarten. I expected a little more drama between BFF's to be honest. :) 

a kid knocks down my tower

bullies come in the school

boys don't listen

the room is messy

I got paint on me

A shelf fell on my head

someone skips me in line (the most grievous of offenses!)

I got hit by a soccer ball

no book club

when I get hurt and when I get mad and when I go home.