Gr. 1 Unit: Courageous Leaders - Past and Present

Rationale or Purpose of Unit

In this unit students will explore universal qualities of leadership with a focus on courage. Throughout the unit students will examine the concept of courage, how fictional characters demonstrate courage, and how historical leaders demonstrated courage. By the end of the unit students will examine how ordinary people, including themselves, show courage to improve the world. Lessons and seeds are structured to teach many language skills and concepts. In addition, they provide whole group read alouds, shared readings, independent readings, and close readings as students answer text-dependent questions. Students experience multiple exposures to a text and/or multiple exposures to a concept through various texts. Dimpity Dumpty: The Story of Humpty's Little Sister by Bob Graham and of Thee I Sing: A Letter to My Daughters by Barack Obama serve as anchor texts, and along with other text models, teach grade one reading, language, writing, and speaking and listening standards.

Throughout the unit, students will ask and answer questions to analyze text, write in response to texts, and engage in collaborative conversations. Lessons and seeds provide explicit instruction in opinion writing, and the unit culminates with shared research. The unit incorporates art and music as students create weekly courage related crafts, and compose a courage song.

These lessons and seeds can be adjusted to meet the needs and interests of individual students (see additional resources). The sequence of lessons and seeds, as well as the lesson design, were developed with gradual release of responsibility with an emphasis on collaborative student groups. Utilizing a multi-sensory and multi-media approach incorporates multiple components of UDL.

TEXT MODEL

Consider the need for Accessible Instructional Materials (AIM) and/or for captioned/described video when selecting texts, novels, video and/or other media for this unit. See "Sources for Accessible Media" for suggestions at http://marylandlearninglinks.org/.

Lyrics to : All About Courage Song: http://www.bing.com/videos/
search?q=courageous+videos+for+kids&mid=4A0A14AB8D4D82BA
AFEF4A0A14AB8D4D82BAAFEF&view=detail&FORM=VIRE2

The I Am Not Scared Book by Todd Parr Chico The Brave by Dave Horowitz Clancy: The Courageous Cow by Lachie Hume Courage by Bernard Waber Dimity Dumpty: The Story of Humpty's Little Sister by Bob Graham Flossie & The Fox by Patricia C. McKissack of Thee I Sing: Letters to My Daughters by Barack Obama Martin's BIG Words: The Life of Martin Luther King Jr. by Doreen Rappaport Abe Lincoln Crosses A Creek: Tall, Thin Tale by Deborah Hopkinson and John Hendrix Our Children Can Soar: A Celebration of Rosa, Barack, and the Pioneers of Change by Michelle Cook