Social Justice in the Classroom

Over the course of the past few months, I have been working to incorporate some aspects of social justice in my classroom. One way is through the use of literature. We have read numerous books on the topic of differences and have engaged in some great discussions. A few weeks ago we read a book by Todd Parr titled, It's Okay to be Different in which we had a discussion about the book. We made connections to our personal lives and discussed how differences can and should be appreciated. Next, the students were able to select an idea and write/illustrate their own idea in celebrating differences. The following  pages are examples of what  three students created using the words, "It's okay to be . . ".

This past week, we read another book that discussed differences as well. This time we used David Shannon's book, A Bad Case of Stripes. Once again we discussed differences and created some ideas for students to use in creating their own work in using the words, "It's okay to be different by . . .".  The students seemed to be very proud of their work and enjoyed using a sentence starter to write their own idea with differences.

Other books to read include the following:

Violet by Tania Duprey Stehlik

Stand Tall Molly Lou Melon by Patty Lovell

Freckleface Strawberry by Julianne Moore

I Like Myself by Karen Beaumont