Teaching Guide:
CITIZENSHIP
for grades K-5
Para ver esta pagína en español, haga clic aquí.
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This material is from the facilitator's guide for the video "Citizenship" in the DVD series The Six Pillars of Character™ featuring the Popcorn Park Puppets™. |
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HOW TO BE
A GOOD CITIZEN
Do your share to make your school, your community, and the world a better place. .
Take responsibility for what goes on around you.
Participate in community service.
Help take care of the environment.
Be a good neighbor.
Treat other people with respect and dignity.
"CITIZENSHIP" the video |
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This video teaches children: • That good citizens do their part to make their community a good place to live. • That they have the power to make a positive difference in the world. |
• Both English and Spanish on same DVD.
• Closed Captioned for the Hearing Impaired.
Click play for a sampling of "Six Pillars of Character " |
"THE SIX PILLARS OF CHARACTER" the series |
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Help your kids explore six essential character virtues with the Popcorn Park Puppets. In each video the puppets become entangled in problems that require them to sort out right from wrong. more. . . |
For more information about individual videos in this series, click on the title below. |
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• Trustworthiness • Respect • Responsibility • Fairness • Caring • Citizenship |
If your school or organization does not have these videos, you can purchase them from Live Wire Media, or request them from your local library.
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Wouldn't this poster or banner look good in your classroom? Click Here!
Meet the
Puppets
Nubbs, Burna, Muggsy, Essie, Groark
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DISCUSSION QUESTIONS If you are using the video, ask questions 1&2 before viewing. 1. What is a hero? 2. Who is one of your heroes? Why, what makes that person a hero?
3. What happened in the video so far? 4. Why did Nubbs pick Captain Planet™ as his hero? How do you feel about Nubbs' choice? Who did Nubbs' friends pick as their heroes? How do you feel about their choices? 5. What does Captain Planet™ mean by, "the power is yours"? 6. Burna says "we're just kids, and kids have no power." Do you agree that kids have no power? Why, or why not? 7. Burna says kids are supposed to play, and
adults are supposed to do all the important stuff. Do you think
Burna is right? Why, or why not? 8. Nubbs wanted to plant trees in order to help the environment. How do trees help the environment? (Clean the air, release oxygen, provide shade, prevent erosion, etc.) 9. What did Nubbs' friends think of his idea about planting trees? What were their objections? (Can't plant enough to make a difference, it's a lot of work, it might rain, where would they get the trees?) 10. Do you think Nubbs' idea to plant trees
is a good one? 11. In the song, Nubbs sings, "Maybe their
help is too much to ask. Maybe it's just too big of a task."
Do you think what Nubbs wants to do is too big of a task? Why? 12. How is Nubbs feeling at the end of Act I? Why do you think he feels this way? 13. Nubbs' friends think he should drop the idea and give up. What do you think he should do? What do you think he will do?
14. Socrates called Nubbs a good citizen. What reasons does he give for saying that? (Because Nubbs cares about more than just himself. He cares about his community, he cares about the world, and he tries to help.) 15. Why did Socrates ask Nubbs where big cities come from? (To make the point that big things are the result of lots of individual people doing their share.) 16. Socrates helped Nubbs see that big things,
like cities, are the result of a lot of individual people each doing
their share. What does that have to do with Nubbs' tree planting
project? 17. How much of a difference will Nubbs and his friends make if they don't plant any trees at all? 18. Nubbs got an idea when Diotima asked him, "what if your tree project could give your friends a way to be just as powerful as their heroes?" What do you think Nubbs' idea is? Do you think he can convince his friends to help? How could he do that?
19. In the first part of this video, Nubbs wanted
to plant a million trees. Was that realistic? 20. How did Nubbs convince his friends to do the tree planting project? (He showed them that they had the power to transform an ugly vacant lot into a beautiful grove of shady trees.) 21. What problems did they have to solve? Did each of them have an important job? What did each of them do? (Nubbs organized the project. Groark and Burna got volunteers from the neighborhood to help. Essie got the garden center to donate the trees, Muggsy got permission from the owner of the lot to plant the trees.) What would have happened if any of them had not done their job? 22. Why did Nubbs' friends make him their hero? Do you think Nubbs is a hero? 23. Who is your hero? Is your choice different now than it was before you watched the video? 24. How did Nubbs and his friends feel about what they accomplished? Have you ever felt that way? What did you do that made you feel that way? 25. What makes your neighborhood or community a nice place to live? What could you do to make your neighborhood or community a better place? 26. By improving the vacant lot, Nubbs and his friends performed a community service. What does good citizenship have to do with community service? 27. What do you think a good citizen is? In what ways are you a good citizen? What is a bad citizen? (If you wish to copy or use any material from this website, please click here for Terms of Use.) |
Questions to ask after showing Act I
Questions to ask after showing Act II
Questions to ask after showing Act III
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To find teaching guides on Citizenship and related topics for other grade levels |
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STUDENT ACTIVITIES 1. What does it mean to be a good citizen? Have your class brainstorm a list of do's and don'ts for citizenship. Ask for specific examples of each behavior they identify. Compare their list with the one at the top of this page. 2. Take the rules from #1, above, and turn them into role-play situations. The kids can act them out themselves or use puppets. Role-play poor citizenship, and then, good citizenship. Have the group critique each of the role-plays. 3. Have your older students go to an internet search engine (e.g., Google) and type in "kids making a difference." They will find countless inspiring examples of how young people have made their communities and the world a better place. Have them select stories they like and present them to the class and tell why they chose them. Do these stories give them any ideas about things they might like to do? If your students are pre-readers, do the search yourself and select stories to read to them.
5. Have the class identify needs in the school or community, and plan a service project to meet those needs. For guidance in planning a service project, visit www.goodcharacter.com and click on "service learning." 6. Have a class discussion about heroes. Have kids select their heroes and write about them. Introduce the idea of heroes as people who do things to help others. For ideas about how do expand this activity visit <www.giraffe.org> 7. Are you doing a really cool eco-project at your school? If so, visit Captain Planet™ Foundation's website, and the Captain may be able to assist in providing the seed money to get your project growing. Go to: www.captainplanetfdn.org (If you wish to copy or use any material from this website, please click here for Terms of Use.) |
4. Have your students visit this
website <www.goodcharacter.com> and click on "Opportunities
for Action." There they will find opportunities to become involved
in community service projects and other activities relating to citizenship
and civic responsibility.
Other teaching guides in this series:
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• Trustworthiness • Respect • Responsibility |
• Fairness • Caring • Citizenship |
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WRITING ASSIGNMENTS
2. Write about someone you consider
to be a hero. 3. Identify a problem in your
community that needs to be fixed.
5. Think of some kind of volunteer work you might like to do. Describe it and tell why you think you would like it. Who would it help, and in what way? For some volunteer ideas, visit <www.goodcharacter.com> and click on "Opportunities for Action." 6. What does it mean to be a good citizen? In what ways are you a good citizen? Give some examples of things you've done that show good citizenship. What things could you do to be a better citizen? 7. Research and write a history of your city or neighborhood or community. Identify individuals and organizations who made especially important contributions or who had a big influence on its development. Publish your book and present it to the library. Make sure the kids understand that things got the way they are because people (citizens) made that happen. For very young children, tell them stories about people and events that shaped the present. (If you wish to copy or use any material from this website, please click here for Terms of Use.) |
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(Copy this block and send it home to the parents.) FOR PARENTS
Your child has just viewed a video entitled The Six Pillars of Character: Citizenship which encourages children to do their share to make the community a better place, and shows them that that even kids their age have the power to make a difference. Here are some things you can do to reinforce the message of this video and our related learning activities.• Ask your child to tell you about the video program and what he or she learned from it. |
TERMS OF USE 
© Copyright Elkind+Sweet Communications, Inc. All rights are reserved. The material in this website is intended for non-commercial educational use. If you wish to copy or use any of this material, please click here for "Terms of Use." Except as provided in "Terms of Use," this material is for private use only and may not be republished or copied without written permission of the publisher.
*Popcorn Park and the Popcorn Park Puppets are trademarks of Elkind+Sweet Communications, Inc./Live Wire Media.
* CHARACTER COUNTS! and the Six Pillars of Character are registered trademarks of the Josephson Institute. www.charactercounts.org