Happy Black History Month Everyone!

This post is to share the wonderful and easy project my students do for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day. I found this awesome post while searching Pinterest (Follow me!) one day.

My only tip is to make a sample prior to the lesson. Sometimes I think I can model an art project for the first time in front of the class, but not this one.   This one has a couple of tricky areas so be sure to complete it first so you’ll better be able to help your students. They need to follow these directions exactly. I think the end products are so cool, even the ones that were done “wrong”.

The other project is the “I Have a Dream” picture project. I basically run off copies of three thought bubbles. One bubble says…”For my school”, the other says…”For my community”, and the last bubble says…”For my world”. After we have a discussion and brainstorm some quality ideas, the students write their dreams on a piece of paper. Once I look that over and proofread it, they get permission to write on the thought bubbles (final draft). A couple days before we complete and assemble this project, I take a picture of each student holding a MLK picture looking up to the sky. I know! It’s so cheesy, but they turn out hilarious. I think the kids secretly like when I do these cheesy photo projects, at least that’s what I tell myself.

Once the pictures are developed, the students assemble them quickly and “Voila!”, an awesome project is complete.

Finally, my students all memorized a portion of Dr. Martin Luther King’s famous speech. I was a little nervous with the complexity of the speech, but my students killed it! Truly a job well done for all of them–so impressed. After all the students finished, we watched the actual footage from The March on Washington. The kids were so into it, and saying the words right along with Dr. King!

Awesome.