ALEDO INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT: Vandagriff Elementary Students Simplify Powerful Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Message

Aledo Independent School District issued the following announcement.

Sometimes the simplified logic of a second grader can be a powerful way to get an important message across.

That was the case last week in Vandagriff Elementary second-grade teacher Christy Overstreet’s class when they had a discussion about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., leading up to the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Day holiday.

Overstreet’s second graders watched part of the “I have a Dream” speech, pulled out some of MLK’s important quotes and discussed what those powerful words meant to them.

“They turned it into a math problem, saying ‘Well, hate plus hate that equals hate, but hate plus love, the love cancels out the hate so we get love,’” Overstreet said. “It was just like, ‘of course!’”

“At the end of the day, it seems so simple.”

After the discussion, each student selected one out of a handful of MLK quotes and wrote what it meant to them and then drew a picture of MLK giving his speech or something else related to the quote and what it meant to them.

Second-grader Campbell F. said MLK, “wanted people to know that no matter what color your skin is, they're still like brothers and sisters.”

Blanton S. said MLK’s message was, “that every person is the same, and should be treated the same as other people,” he said. “You should treat everyone fairly and not different.”

Another favorite part of the lesson for the class was researching facts about MLK for a circle map and also reading, “Martin & Anne: The Kindred Spirits of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Anne Frank” by Nancy Churnin and completing a double bubble map on their similarities and differences.

Overstreet’s second graders completed the lesson with perfection, but she knows their lessons on MLK went beyond reading, writing and comprehension.

“This lesson was important because we took Martin Luther King Jr.’s words, and we applied them to our lives today and how we could put them into action,” Overstreet said. “We made them real to us for today and not just during his time.”

Original source can be found here.