Social Studies - 2nd Grade
Standard 1
Students will select four characters from familiar books and determine if they have healthy or unhealthy characteristics.
Additional Resources
Lemonade for Sale by Stuart Murphy (bar graphs)
How to Be a Friend by Marc Brown
Students will be familiar with words such as caring, responsibility, trust, and respect. Students will be able to provide examples and nonexamples of the above words and other similar words. It is important to use books with which the students are familiar. This lesson is designed to offer an introduction to creating and reading bar graphs.
Intended Learning Outcomes
2. Develop social skills and ethical responsibility.
3. Demonstrate responsible emotional and cognitive behaviors.
5. Understand and use basic concepts and skills.
6. Communicate clearly in oral, artistic, written, and nonverbal form.
Process Skills
Description, data collection and interpretation, form conclusions
Invitation to Learn
Make a T-chart on a chart paper labeled “Relationships.” Label one
side of the T-chart “healthy” and the other side “unhealthy.”
Discuss elements of healthy relationships (caring, responsibility, trust, respect,
etc.). Using Interactive Writing, have students write a few words on each side
of the T-chart.
Instructional Procedures
Possible Extensions/Adaptations
Recommended: break this lesson into several short sessions. Students can create
a friendship list in their journals. Small groups of students survey their classmates
and then create a graph. Each student completes a graph along with the teacher.
Students draw a self-portrait and label with the words from the T-chart. Students
can write about the survey results in their journal. Move into discussion about
media images (K-2 Core Objective 2e), such as characters on TV or in movies.
Are the characters unhealthy behaviors glamorized? (e.g., on the Arthur cartoons,
D.W. tattles on her brother.)
Family Connections
Students will take a list of three to four “healthy” words home
and decide which word best describes different members of his or her family.
A new class graph can be made for “Words that Describe Mom” (or
another family member).
During the class discussion, which students are comfortable with the vocabulary, and which students are struggling?
During interactive writing, do most students form their letters correctly? Is spelling conventional, transitional, or phonetic?
Ask each student a question about the graph (the “how many more” type questions are the hardest). Which students are able to answer the questions quickly? Which students require prompts or modeling to answer the questions?