Detailed Lesson Preparation Guide

Elementary Education
Name: McKenzie Weed

Title: Bringing Compassion Back to the Classroom

Grade: First

Concept/Topic: Friendship, compassion, kindness, anti-bullying

Time Needed: 40 minutes

Backward Design Approach: Where are you going with your students?

Identify Desired Results/Learning Outcome/Essential Question:

Throughout the semester, we have noticed that the students in our classroom lack compassion

and kindness for one another. Through this lesson, we would like to promote friendship and

thoughtfulness towards one another. At the conclusion of the lesson students will be able to

complete the following tasks:

Define what it means to be kind.

Give examples of kind deeds they can do in the classroom.

Define what compassion is.

Ensuring Lesson supports district and state goals

NCSCOS Standards:

Key Ideas and Details

2. Retell Stories, including key details, and demonstrate understanding of their central message

or lesson

3. Describe character, setting and major events in a story using key details
Assessment Plan:

At the conclusion of our lesson we will have a full class discussion about what it means to be

kind to others. Students will then be given a sentence starter that reads What does it mean to be

kind. After each student has written their answer on an index card we will arrange the index

cards so that it spells out kind. The index cards will be glued on a large piece of paper. At the top

of the paper we will write What does it mean to be This can be displayed in the hallway or

in the classroom to remind students each day on how they can be kind to one another.

Meeting the student where they are:

Prior Knowledge/Connections:

We know that throughout the year, our mentor teacher has been working with the students on

their story retelling skills during their literacy block. Student have read many different books and

have been given different tools to retell parts of their story. These parts include setting,

characters, problem/conflict, beginning, middle, end, and solution. Since students are already

familiar with this, they should be able to quickly retell the parts of our read aloud.

Lesson Introduction/Hook:

I will read a book titled Because Amelia Smiled. This book talks about a chain of good deeds

that started because Amelia smiled. I will stop periodically to ask the students comprehension

questions. These stopping points are marked by sticky notes in the book. At the conclusion of the

book the students will be asked to create a story map of the problem, solution, characters, setting,

beginning, middle, and end. Students will be asked engaging questions like what does the word

kind mean?
Heart of the Lesson/Learning Plans

Differentiation/Same-ation:

This is a very simple yet effective lesson that is accessible to all students. Students who are more

confident in their writing skills will be invited more extensively (on their index cards) about how

they can be kind. Students who need support in this area can write a few words to describe their

ideas. Both formats allow students to think critically about their own actions and will portray to

Payton and myself that they understood the lesson.

This lesson is always great because it allows the full class to be involved in a discussion. During

the activity, students are asked to write something nice about each of their classmates. Thus, by

the end of the lesson everyone will know what it is like the write something nice as well as to

read nice things written about them. At the conclusion of the activity each student will have an

emotion about how it felt to give and receive kind words. This will allow the entire class to

engage in the conversation rather than just one or two students.

Lesson Development:

Payton will read the book titled What does it mean to be kind. This book goes through the

different ways that a person can be kind. This book does not really have a plot line so the

students will be doing a modified story map to overview the book.

Students will already be on the carpet but will be asked to form a circle as white boards are

handed out to each student. The purpose of the white boards is just so that students have
something hard to write on for the activity. Each student will also be given a sheet of paper and a

marker. Students will be instructed to write their names at the top of their paper. We will tell

them that this is a great way to show compassion towards others and to put everything we had

just learned into action.

The activity is called Freeze it! Students will rotate around the circle writing kind things on

their peers papers. Students will be given 30 seconds at each paper and then will FREEZE. Then

they will have to immediately move to the next persons paper. After the students have moved to

each of their peers papers they will be able to get their own paper back and see all of the kind

things their peers have written about them.

At the end of the activity, we will talk with students about how it felt to be kind to others and

how it felt to hear all the kind things their peers had to say about them. We will remind students

that they should always be kind to their peers.

Students will then be given their assessment. We will write the question What does it mean to

be kind? We will also read the question out loud and give a 30 second wait time so students

think about their answers. During this wait time, we will pass out an index card to each student.

Students will be instructed to write their answer on their index card and then bring it up to the

front of the class when they are finished.

question What does it mean to be at the top of the paper. As the students start bringing up

their index cards, we will arrange the cards to spell out Kind.

After the poster is complete it will be displayed in the hallway to show to other students at Bugg

Elementary that Mrs. Kearns class knows what it means to be kind to one another.

To close the lesson, students will be challenged to do one kind deed to another student in the

class each day. We will ask the students to talk with someone at home about what they learned

and brainstorm ways they could be kind at home. They will be asked to write these down and

bring them into class the following day.

Specific Questioning:

What does it mean to be kind?

What can you do to be kind to others?

What does it mean to be compassionate?

What is a friendship?

New Vocabulary:

Kind- having or showing a friendly, generous, or considerate nature

Friendship- have a good and caring relationship with someone

Compassion- the understanding of others and wanting to do something about it

At the closing of the lesson, students will be encouraged to do at least one kind deed every day.

We will remind them that if they need to review what they can do to be kind to someone, they

can look at the poster that they made and is displayed in the hallway.

Materials/Resources:

What does it mean to be kind book

Because Amelia smiled book

Printer Paper

Clipboards or white boards (just used so that students have a hard surface to write on)

Colorful index cards

Bulletin board paper

Tape

Teaching Behavior Focus:

In this lesson, we would like to focus on student engagement through classroom discussion.

While the class engages in discussion daily, we wanted to create a more focused and meaningful

discussion that allows all students to contribute. The conversation will not be dominated by one

or two students but will be extended to all 16 students in the classroom.

Follow-Up Activities/Parent Involvement

We will talk to students about telling someone at home what they learned about kindness. We

will ask them to brainstorm some ideas with their family members about how they can be kind to
others outside the classroom. We will then ask the students to bring their ideas to class the next

day so that they can be added to the poster.

This activity will give parents a good idea about what the students are learning in class and how

they can support this learning at home. Hopefully being aware in this learning will allow the

people at home to hopefully see a change in their childs behaviors and friendships.