Many thanks to all you folks who replied to my inquires on the poverty unit
for our seventh graders. I will surely look at your suggestions and form
the unit around the ideas.
Many thanks,
Mary Kathryn
Teacher, LMS Student
Peasley Middle School
Gloucester, Va.
mdiggs@gc.k12.va.us
Your compiled responses:
MK,
There is an old book for Christmas called The Mellops' Christmas. It is
about a family of pigs just after the war trying to make money to buy a
Christmas tree. Each one of the pigs gets a Christmas and they decide to
spread Christmas around the neighborhood. As they spread their Christmas
cheer, they find people who are poor, sick, and lonely. They decided to use
their money to help out these people (pigs). It is a wonderful story to
show how things are right in your neighborhood. If I can find a copy, I
will borrow it for you. If I do not have it, I will get one. When are you
teaching this lesson?
----------------------------------------------------
Check out the http://www.readtofeed.org/ site from Heifer International.
They have middle and high school level materials available for free.
Mary,
One idea that you might incorporate is to be a smart consumer that
treads lightly on the earth. Even if you are middle class or wealthy, the
fewer resources that you use means that there are more resources for
everyone else. Since we live in a country that has about 5% of the world's
population and uses about 25% of the world's resources, we have a big
learning curve that needs to be bridged.
"Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to
find out that going to the mountains is going home; that wilderness is a
necessity; and that mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as
fountains of timber and irrigating rivers, but as fountains of life."
Mary,
It's great to see that you are teaching a unit on a topic this important and
relevant.
I think you will find much valuable material at the United Nations'
Cyberschoolbus site. They have a unit on Poverty designed for students
grades 5-12. Access it at
http://www.un.org/cyberschoolbus/poverty2000/index.asp
You can find much more material on our website Educational Hotlinks for
Middle School People, located at
http://tinyurl.com/l5xst
------------------------------------
Have you looked at the materials at the Teaching Tolerance Website. I
haven't investigated them myself but I know they have activities for a unit
called the ABCs of Domestic Poverty. They have lots of free curriculum
materials for teachers that I have used in the past. All of excellent
quality. Their website is www.tolerance.org
-------------------------
Mary Kathryn,
There is an excellent book called A Framework for Understanding Poverty by
Ruby K. Payne PhD that would be useful for your students as a part of your
unit. Good luck!
You might want to assign groups of students different chapters of:
Nickel and dimed : on (not) getting by in America / [by] Barbara
Ehrenreich.
New York : Owl, 2002,c2001.
Subjects Unskilled labor.
Minimum wage.
Poverty.
United States -- Social conditions.
Description: 230 p. ; 22 cm.
Summary: Examines the society of the unskilled, lower class work-force in
the United States by following the odyssey of the author as she works
minimum wage jobs as a waitress, cleaning woman, and retail clerk.
ISBN: 0805063897
It's a pretty readable account of what it's like to work hard at a job that
still doesn't pay enough to keep you out of poverty. The undercover
reporter takes jobs at Wal-Mart, Merry Maids, etc., and tries to actually
live on what she earns. Your kids might start recognizing that poverty
isn't just about "those people" in slums, ghettos, and rural America; it's
also about people they probably interact with every day. Perhaps they could
interview neighbors or family who work/ed in similar jobs. (I was a cashier
in high school; I could relate.) Then students could research those
organizations and write letters to the editor about the working poor or
working conditions in America.
I would put the challenge to them. With my seniors they are asked to
identify a social problem, learn about it, find out what's being done and
why its not working and then come up with their own ideas. I realize the
significant age difference, but you'd be amazed with what kids can come up
with.
How about that vocabulary site where you donate free rice to a charity as
you answer the questions? It was discussed on the list before Christmas.
Although, I am sure you would want to do some things in addition to that.
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