LESSON PLAN TEMPLATE

Your Name: Yahira Romero

Title of Lesson: What is poverty?
Grade: 2nd
STANDARDS
AZCCRS
2.l.4- Use a known root word as a clue to the meaning of an unknown word with the same root
(eg. Addition, additional)
Social Studies: concept 4: PO 1. Discuss examples of responsible citizenship in the school
setting and in stories about the past and present.
LESSON SUMMARY/OVERVIEW
Provide an overview/synopsis of the lesson and the topics that it will cover. Make sure to
provide a reason why you selected this to be relevant for a unit on sustainability?
In this lesson, students are required to use Values Thinking and Futures Thinking as a basis for
discussion. This lesson will focus on introducing poverty to 2nd graders. We will be learning
about poverty and the disadvantages of poverty. The students will be introduced to new
vocabulary that goes with poverty. We are also going to talk about poverty and how it affects our
community and world. Once we know those terms we will read a book and discuss how that
books ties in with our unit of poverty.
OBJECTIVES
- Students will be able to define words that have a suffix by using the root word.
- Students will be able to explain what poverty looks like.
- Students will be able to explain a plan they have to help poverty.
ASSESSMENT/EVALUATION
What measures will you use to know if your students met the objectives?
- The students will write a reflection of what they think poverty is and how they are going
to help people who live in poverty. (Futures Thinking)
PREREQUISITE KNOWLEDGE
What will students need to know prior to completing this lesson and how will you access
their prior knowledge?
- Prior to this lesson, students need to think about people they have seen wandering the
streets and/ or sleeping in the streets. I want them to think of how they felt. How do they
think the people feel? What could they have done to help them?
MATERIALS
List of required materials.
Selavi, That is Life: A Haitian Story of Hope
Poster paper
VOCABULARY/KEY WORDS
List of key vocabulary terms.
- Values Thinking- values that are taught and are important to us.
-Futures Thinking- thinking of how our future will be impacted.
- Benefit- a good or helpful result or effect.

- Common goods- the goods around our economy.

- Community- a group of people who live in the same area.
- Needs
TEACHING PROCEDURES
Procedural Steps (Step by step instructions for teaching the lesson):
1. Place the book in the front of the classroom. Have the students predict what the story
might be like from looking at the outside of the book. Teacher: Look at the cover of this
page. Talk with your partners and predict what this story might be about.
a. Students should discuss with partners for about 2 minutes.
b. Students responses can vary: I predict that the story will be about a boy and a
girl, the boy and or girl could be lost, the boy and girl could be friends or siblings
and are walking around.
2. After predicting what the book is about, now begin to read the book aloud to the class.
There are many pages to stop and have discussions with the students so they can
understand what is happening throughout the text.
a. Stop when the word disappear and homeless appear. Write the word on the board.
Have the students break the word up dis-appear and home-less. As a class have,
the students define the word and come up with a definition for each word.
b. Have students discuss the word then call on different students throughout the
classroom.
c. Continue reading. Throughout the book ask question
i. Who is Selavi? (describe him)
1. Students respond- Selavi is a young boy who is homeless.
ii. Where are they?
1. Students respond- They are in Haiti. (Explain Haiti is another
country)
iii. Does he have a home like you?
1. Students respond- No, he does not have a home.
iv. What is a problem that is in the story?
1. Students respond-Selavi doesnt have a home and is moving from
house to house and or living on the street.
v. What are some differences and similarities between you and Selavi?
1. Students respond- Answer varies based on students.
vi. What could you do to help the boy?
1. Students respond- Answer varies.
vii. Have you seen children, men, and/ or women like this here in our city?
1. Students respond- Yes,
viii. Have you done something to help them? What can you do to help them or
brighten their day?
1. Students respond- Answer will vary depending on student.
ix. How was the problem solved?
1. Students response- Selavi found a home and he stayed there.
x. How can we as students help Selavi find a home?
1. Students respond- We tell adults about him and see if they can
help Selavi find a home.

3. Okay, now that we are done reading our book, I want you to think of the words homeless,
poverty, and disappear.
a. Have students define the words with a partner and then share as a class.
b. Okay come back as a group. I need some volunteers to share their answers with
the class.
4. Now have the students put themselves in the position of Selavi. What would you do?
How would you reach out to others and inform them of the situation?
a. Students answers should vary.
5. Explain to the students that Selavi lives in another country and he is homeless and needs
help. Think of ways in which you can help homeless people and how this will benefit our
future.
a. The teacher will ask questions to the students: What are some things your value
(care about)? (Values Thinking)
b. How can you help people in poverty? Inform the students that even though they
are small they can still make a difference. (Futures Thinking)
6. As a class now lets think of how we can come up with a plan on how to help people in
poverty.
a. Give students about 5 minutes to brainstorm with their friends around them.
b. Students can respond- Can we collect food? Can we collect clothing for them?
What if we found information on shelters?
7. Teacher responds- Yes, those are all great ways to reduce poverty. What can we do as a
community? (Write students response on the board) Once all the ideas are written down
have the students pick their favorite and think about why they are picking that one idea.
a. Students respond- Can we also inform them on how to donate clothing items,
food, and other materials so we can help families get out of being in poverty and
being homeless.
8. When you go home tonight, I want you to inform the your families of poverty and your
idea on how to help people who are poor.

RESOURCES
List any references you used to create this lesson. If you borrowed ideas from any lesson
plans please note them here. Use APA format.
[Learning to Give] 2010. Many Hands Together Make a Lighter Load (2nd grade).
Retrieved from http://learningtogive.org/lessons/unit448/lesson1.html
Youme Landowne. Selavi, That is Life: A Haitian Story of Hope. Cinco Puntos Press, 2004.
ISBN: 0938317849
WAYS OF THINKING CONNECTION
Provide a complete explanation of how your lesson plan connects to futures, system,
strategic, or values thinking. Define the way of thinking you selected and used in this
lesson plan. Remember, this should be included meaningfully in the lesson plan.

In this lesson plan, I plan to stress that together we can make a difference in our Futures and
Values Thinking. Our poverty numbers can decrease with the help of all of us. There are
approximately 25 of us, we have someone we can share this information of poverty. That
someone has a friend that can get educated and the information is passed on. In this time, we are
seeing many people living in poverty. These numbers will decrease as time passes on and we all
start helping our community. Futures thinking has to do with thinking within our future and how
we can make a small impact that we will see in the future.