President’s Day

President’s Day

Money

Objective: Helping children understand why we celebrate President’s day and what the USA President does and how he becomes President.

Preparation:

•  Find drawings or pictures of Presidents, presidential memorials and other patriotic symbols from books, magazines, Internet or old calendars.
• Various coins and bills that depict presidents.

Lesson:

Discuss while showing pictures:

• President’s Day is a way to honor all United States presidents. The president is the manager or director of the federal government. The president sees the laws of the land are enforced and obeyed. He promises to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution.  The jobs of the President include suggesting a law, approving or vetoing laws, appointing advisers and Supreme Court justices, working on the budget, meeting with his Cabinet and other advisers, making speeches, or responding to national and international crises.
• Many Presidents have monuments built to remember them. some of the best known are The Washington Monument, Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials and Mt. Rushmore .
• Show the children coins and bills featuring the portraits of presidents. Teach them which president is shown on each coin or bill.
• In the United States, voters across the country exercise their right to vote for their president. Voting is one of the few times when all grown-ups in the U.S. have an equal say. No matter how much money you have or who your friends are, you only get one vote.  Voting is an important part of being a U.S. Citizen. To demonstrate the concept of voting, offer opportunities to make decisions in the classroom with a vote. 
  

Discussion questions:

• What activities do you think presidents do everyday?
• What would you do if you were president?
• Who are some of the presidents you know?

Possible Activities:

Give each child some dark blue paper and white chalk.  Show them a picture of the White House where the presidents live.  Have them draw the White House with the white chalk.

Take profile pictures of the children.  Adjust them to a black and white image.  Print on card stock.   Draw a circle on the print.  Have each child cut out a coin of themselves. They can write the year, USA, Liberty, and their name on the coin.  (Take these pictures in advance.) 

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Symbols of The USA–The Statue of Liberty

 

The Statue of Liberty

Objective: To introduce children to The Statue of Liberty as a symbol of USA promise of freedom. 

Preparation:

• Find drawings or pictures of The Statue of Liberty from books, magazines or old calendars.
• Have green crayons, pencils or markers and paper for the children.  (Print,”The Statue of Liberty” on the paper.)
• Suggested book:   The Statue of Liberty by Lucille Recht Penner

Lesson:

• Read the book then discuss while showing pictures:
• The Statue of Liberty is one of the most recognizable symbols of the United States in the world. For many visitors traveling by sea in days gone by, the statue located on Liberty Island, in New York harbor, was their first glimpse of America.
• The statue symbolizes liberty and democracy.
• The Statue of Liberty is a huge sculpture that is located on Liberty Island in New York Harbor. This monument was a gift to the USA from the people of France.
• Liberty was designed by the French sculptor Frederic Auguste Bartholdi. The hollow copper statue was built in France – it was finished in July, 1884.  It was brought to the USA in 350 pieces on a French ship.  The statue was reassembled in the USA and was completed on October 28, 1886.
• Liberty’s right hand holds a torch that is a symbol of liberty. There are 354 steps inside the statue and its pedestal. There are 25 viewing windows in the crown. The seven rays of Liberty’s crown symbolize the seven seas and seven continents of the world. Liberty holds a tablet in her left hand that reads “July 4, 1776” (in Roman numerals).
• This is the poem that is mounted on the base of the statue.  Emma Lazarus wrote it.

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
with conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
a mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame,
“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
with silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

Discussion questions:

• What is liberty?  — the power of choice.
• What is a symbol? —  something visible that by association or convention represents something else that is invisible.
• What are some other symbols of our country? — The Flag, Eagle, etc.

Activities:

• Draw the statue. Give each child a paper and a green pencil or crayon. Help the children draw the statue one step at a time. Wait to start each step until all children have completed the previous step.
• Pictures of the kids: Take each child one at a time. Wrap a green sheet around the child and attach at shoulder. Have them wear a Statue of Liberty headband (you can get them from Liberty Tax or have them make one). Give them a flashlight to hold in their left hand. In their right hand give them a small poster board with “July 4th 1776” written on it. Have them pose like the Statue of Liberty and take a picture.

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Symbols of The USA–The Bald Eagle

Symbols of The USA-The Bald Eagle

Objective: Help children understand the Bald Eagle is one of the Symbols of the United States of America.

Preparation:       

Find drawings or pictures of bald eagles from books, magazines or old calendars.

Puppet Materials Needed:

• paper lunch bags,
• white paper cut to the size of the flap of the paper bag,
• some crayons,
• scissors,
• glue,
• construction paper brown, white and yellow

Suggested books:

• An Eagle Flies High by Alice Pernick
• Eagle by Lloyd G Douglas

Lesson:

Read a book.

Discuss the eagle as a symbol of our country, while showing pictures.

• The bald eagle is a large, powerful, brown bird with a white head and tail.
• The bald eagle was chosen because it has a long life, strength, beauty and freedom.
• This majestic bird can only be found in North America.
• The word “bald” white not having no feathers.  It comes from an old word which means “white.”
• Bald Eagles live near large bodies of open water such as lakes, marshes, seacoasts and rivers, where there are plenty of fish to eat and tall trees for nesting and roosting.

Activity-Paper sack puppet:

• Cover the FLAP of the paper bag with white paper.
• Draw the eyes onto the HEAD. Demonstrate how to draw eyes step by step. (1. Draw 2 half circles.  2. Make a circle in each half circle. 3. Make a dot in each circle). If you like, you can use sticker eyes.
• On yellow paper help the children draw a beak. (Make an upside-down teardrop shape with little lines for nostrils)  Have the children cut them out.
• Using brown construction paper, help the children draw wings. (Make half circles that each cover half of the paper; draw in “U’s” along the bottom edges to look like feathers.)
• Using white construction paper, help the children draw tail feathers. (An upside-down heart with an extra bump.) (Can use scraps from the wings.) Have the children cut them out.
• Have the children color and embellish their drawings. Glue the beak under the eyes. It will hang down over the BODY.
• Make sure you only put glue on top of the beak (where it touches the HEAD) so you don’t end up gluing the mouth shut.
• Glue the wings into the FLAP.
• Glue the tail on the BACK.

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Symbols of The USA—The Flag

USA Symbols—The Flag

Objective: Help children understand the importance of the United States flag as a symbol of the USA and teach the Pledge of Allegiance.

Preparation:

• Cut rectangles from blue construction paper:  4 ½ ” x 6” (one for each student)
• Cut strips of red construction paper:  6” x ¾” (four for each student), and 12 x ¾ (three for each student)
• White 12 x 9 construction paper (one for each student)
• White crayons or pencils
• Stickers; preferably with flags
• USA flag
• Suggested books:
• The Pledge of Allegiance by Lloyd G Douglas
• The Flag We Love by Pam Munoz Ryan

Lesson:

• Read a flag book and discuss.
• What is a flag? A flag is a piece of cloth, in the shape of a rectangle with colors, and designs.
• Display a flag.
• Discuss that red, white and blue are the colors of our country, The United States of America.
• Have children count the thirteen stripes. Show that six are white and seven are red.
• The blue rectangle has 50 white stars which represent each state.
• Every country has a national flag. A national flag represents a country’s citizens. When you are the citizen of a country it is like being part of a team and you work together to take care of the country.
• Read and discuss The Pledge of Allegiance book.
• Citizens of the United States make an important promise called The Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag. When we make this pledge, we promise to be good citizens.   Explain the language of the pledge to help the children understand. “I pledge (promise) allegiance (to follow and protect) to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic (USA) for which it stands, one Nation (country), under God, indivisible (which cannot be divided and all the states remain together), with liberty (freedom) and justice (fairness) for all.”
• Discuss and demonstrate how we place our RIGHT hand over our heart when we say the pledge to show respect.
• Place a sticker on the children’s right wrist to help them remember which hand is their right hand.
• Help them recite the Pledge.

Activity: Make your own flag.

• Place the blue rectangle at the top left.
• Have the children glue the red strips onto the white construction paper. Show them how to put the 4 short strips at the top right side and the 3 long strips at the bottom leaving spaces in between for the white stripes.
• Have the children add the stars using white pencils or crayon.  Show some simple ways to make stars, such as draw a “t” then draw and “x” on top.
  

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The USA–Our Country

USA: OUR COUNTRY

Objective:  Learn the name of our country (USA), what our country looks like, how a map of our country looks and which state is our state.

Preparation:

• Print out map of the USA. Here is a link to a good map (USA with State Outlines)you can use:  http://www.coloringcastle.com/state_coloring_pages.html
• Have crayons.
• Find a big map of the USA and a globe.
• Books and/or pictures about our country.
• Suggested books:  Me on the Map by Joan Sweeney,  In Our Country by Susan Canizares and Daniel Morton,  America the Beautiful by Scholastic   (The following link is to Scholastic if you would like this book.)  http://store.scholastic.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay_America+the+Beautiful_10311_-1_10052_10051

Lesson:

• Read a book or use pictures to talk about our country.
• Show the children big maps of the USA and point out the states and the oceans and boundaries.
• Show which state is their state and talk about it and other states they have heard of.
• Show the United States on a globe and where the children are relative to the whole world.
• Describe where places are located on a map using relative distance and direction, such as near-far, above-below and cardinal directions (north, south, east, and west).

Activity:

• Pass out printed map worksheets and crayons to children.
• Show the children the words “United States of America”. Tell them this is the name of our country but it is a very long name so we can shorten it by calling it USA. Show them how to write USA on their map.
• Show them the state they live in and tell them the name of the state. Write in the name of the state on the map. Have them color it.
• Ask them if they have been to any other states (grandma’s house in Arizona, Disneyland in California, etc.) and have the child color them.

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Maps-City, State, Country

Maps

Objective: Children will learn what maps are, what they city/state/country is, and how maps are used.

Preparation:

• Find maps of your city, state, country and the world from books, magazines or old calendars.

• crayons or colored pencils

• Print out map book from the attached link map book for the blog. Find a map of the city where the children live and paste it on page 4. Highlight the street where each child lives for each child’s book.

• Suggested book:

• • Me On The Map by Joan Sweeney

Lesson:
Read the book then discuss while showing pictures.

Maps represent a variety of locations. Maps can be of small areas like a room or show larger areas like the world. Maps are a bird’s eye view of objects and show basic items. They use symbols to represent different things. Maps use the directions north, south, east and west. It’s important when making a map or reading a map to know which direction is north.
Discussion questions:

• What is your city?
• What is your state?
• What is your country?
• What are some other cities, states, countries you’ve visited or heard of?

Activity: Make your own map book.

Cover: Have children write their name on the line. As you do each page, first read the page. Do the activities listed below for each page then read the page again, encouraging the children to read along and touch the words as the read them.

Page 2: Point out your country and have the children color it.

Page 3: Help the children find their state and have them color it.

Page 4: Have the children draw their state and mark where their city is on it.

Page 5: Tell the children the name of their city and show them that you highlighted the street they live on.

Page 6:Tell each child his address and write it in the blank. Have the children draw their house with them in it. Write the house number on the house.