What Does It Mean to Be American?

We've just wrapped up our American Symbols unit.  I loved this unit last year and I didn't change too much about this for this year.  Once again, this unit was a big hit with the kiddos.  First graders just love learning about national symbols!  I think this is probably, in part, because once they learn these symbols they find them everywhere: there are bald eagles on quarters, on top of flag poles, on signs all over DC!

 Toward the end of this unit, I had the kiddos choose an American symbol to write about it on our banner paper.  They had to write the name of the symbol and any common names for it.  They also included what the symbol looks like, stands for, and why it is important.  This served as a great assessment to see what kiddos had learned and remembered about each of the symbols.  This could easily be made into a book with each of the symbols, although this year I just had them each do one.

I also had the kiddos write the meaning and importance of the civic values we learned about, such as liberty, independence, courage, and fairness.  It was interesting to see the things that the kiddos pulled out from all of our discussions and stories.  The kiddos were very impressed that America had won independence from the British (I tried to stress that America and Britain now get along, but I think the firsties might still have hard feelings!)  They certainly got the point that Americans value bravery and freedom.

I put up a bulletin board today to showcase our learning from this unit.  I titled the board "What does it mean to be a American?" because our focus has really been on how all of these symbols and values connect to our history and culture as Americans.  This board is actually on the first floor (not in front of our classroom) so it will get a lot of traffic.  Already, I've seen other kiddos walking by getting excited to see familiar symbols and words! That's bulletin board success in my mind :)

American Symbols

This month we are studying American Symbols.  I introduced the concept by watching a BrainPop Jr. video.  (BrainPopJr. is a great site for videos, games, and lesson ideas on a variety of topics.)  Then we played an American Symbols BINGO as a fun review of the symbols we'd learned.  I also used this as a basic assessment of how well the kids could identify each symbol.

After the introduction lesson, I've spent each of the next few lessons exploring one symbol more in-depth. So far we have studied the Flag and the Bald Eagle.  I loved our Bald Eagle lesson.  We read The Bald Eagle, part of the American Symbols series, and learned about the Founding Fathers debate over which bird should be our National Emblem.  George Washington suggested the Bald Eagle, but Benjamin Franklin wanted it to be the Wild Turkey.  The kiddos got their own Bald Eagle to vote about whether they thought the Bald Eagle was a good choice.  (On the eagle they wrote things like, "Yes because it is a strong bird" or "Yes because it is a symbol of freedom.")  You can see there was no disagreement among my little patriots :)

I'm excited to continue this unit, especially as we approach an important election!  More to come on that...