Celebrating Diversity and MLK

There are so many reasons to celebrate the Martin Luther King Jr. and it's not just something to be studied and celebrated one day a year. Recently, I had the opportunity to partner with our elementary ELA department to write a lesson plan to encourage our teachers and students to make meaningful connections to the essence of Dr. King's work and legacy. The lesson plan connects to our local district celebration, which will be held on the evening of January 24. Be on the look out for lots of social media posts sharing the event with #pisdcreatesart. It's an annual celebration of diversity in honor of Dr. King and I'm very proud that we work in a district that makes it a point to highlight both our diverse community and Dr. King's legacy. Each year the committee starts work in August and we develop a theme, this year's theme is "I am Plano ISD." We are ALL essential to the community and contribute to this wonderful school district, it is something to be celebrated.

While I can not share our the full lesson plan, I wanted to share with you the EU, EQ and target and a few resources to help spark a possible lesson plan idea for you!

Enduring Understanding: Collaboration, diversity, and uniqueness help us to be a great community.

Essential Question: What unique role do I play in my community?

Learning Target: Create a visual or written poem or essay that describes and/or demonstrates citizens’ unique roles in their community.

Unfortunately, I'm not sure where the image below originated as it was posted and reposted on social media today but I feel it leads to an important question. Dr. King believed in the power of education and critical thinking.

How do you share Dr. King's message and inspire critical thinking in your classroom?