You're So BIG Now! Lesson Plan

Download this Lesson Plan

What We Are Learning

 

Social Studies Focus:

growing up

 

Theme Vocabulary:

big kid

 

Skills We’re Practicing:

group discussion, critical thinking, vocabulary, self-awareness, handwriting/letter recognition

  • I Am Enough by Grace Byers follows a little girl as she learns and grows through different activities. Sometimes she’s successful and sometimes she makes mistakes. But through it all, she knows that she will emerge triumphant because she doesn’t give up. As you read, ask children to share times when things were tough, but they persevered. How did it feel?

Welcome Note to Next Year’s Class

Materials: chart paper, markers

  • Help your class to usher in a new group of excited learners!
  • Gather children in the meeting area. Remind them of how much they’ve learned and grown this year! Now it’s time to move on to the next grade.
  • Ask them to take turns sharing some of the things they’ve learned in school.
  • Tell your students that you will all work together to create a welcome letter for next year’s class.
  • Begin with a friendly greeting like, “Dear New Class, Welcome to Mrs. Smith’s Classroom! Here are a few things we liked to do best:”
  • Include a list of each child’s favorite thing to do in class. Add a closing line, such as, “Good luck!” Have all the children sign their names at the bottom of the note. self-awareness/ writing

Materials: 10 sheets of white paper, markers

  • Practice counting, number recognition, and gross-motor skills with this easy activity.
  • To prepare, write one number on each sheet of paper, numbering 1 to 10. (If your students can recognize numbers 11 through 20, you can use those instead!)
  • Gather in the meeting area or a space where children can safely do big movements. Tell children that now that they are big kids, they can show off their big kid moves! Hold up the page with the number 1 and ask, “What number is this? Who can do a big movement 1 time?” Choose a child to demonstrate their big movement. Then encourage the rest of the class to join their classmate by copying their movement.
  • Then hold up the number 2, ask the class to identify it, and invite a different student to demonstrate a big movement—but this time, the student will do their movement 2 times. Encourage students to copy the movement, counting as they move. Continue this pattern until the number 10.
  • Then work backward, counting down from 10, to let all children have a chance to show off their cool big kid moves! gross-motor skills/number recognition/counting