Letters to Mom and Dad!
The first and second grade students were reading the book Pete the Cat Rock on Mom and Dad. It is a story where Pete the Cat realizes that his parents do so much for him so Pete decides to write a song for his parents. This started a class discussion about all the things our parents do for us. Some of the students’ answers were as follows: “takes me to school, makes my lunch, goes to the park with me, goes to work for me, plays with me, loves me, takes me to a hotel, cooks for me, and buys me things.” The class then discussed how we should say thank you to our parents because they do these things for us everyday.
As we discussed I wrote the students ideas on the board. I then asked each student to choose what their parents do for them and write three things on the thank you card. We made a card for Mom and a card for Dad. The students choose their background colors then cut and glued the cards together. They also colored and drew fun designs on the cards. I encouraged the students to try their best on the cards to for when they give the cards to their parents. As we worked the students’ excitement grew thinking of how much their parents would enjoy receiving the cards. At the end of the lesson the students were saying how fun that project was and how happy their Mom’s and Dad’s would be.
In this lesson students were able to enjoy a fun craft while learning about gratitude. It allowed students to see their parents jobs in a new perspective. They learned about how to show appreciation for everything their parents do. This is a great lesson in life that we should never stop learning. We should always show thankfulness and gratitude to the people who help us everyday.