Focusing on Our Strengths and Clean Water for Kenya

This week I spent time in the 2nd and 3rd grade classes. I read the book, Zero by Kathryn Otoshi to all 2nd grade classes. I worked with third grade on test anxiety and how to calm their nerves before the big STAAR test. More on that lesson next week because I will be doing the same lesson with 4th and 5th grade next week.

Zero is about the number zero and how she feels like she doesn't have "value" or "count like the other numbers do. She tries to change herself to be like "one" and when that doesn't work, she tries to be like "eight" and "nine." Zero finds she can only be Zero and then decides instead she'll try to impress everyone, but that ends up in a disaster, too. With the help of her friend "seven," Zero discovers that she does have value and that the numbers can't go any higher than nine without her. She discovers all of her inner strengths and that it's what's on the inside that counts. After we read the story, I had the kids think about their inner strengths and what makes them special. I told them to not only think of things, such as they are a great football player, or have awesome hair, but something from the inside, such as being a nice person or making people laugh. They then turned their "zeros" into their own bodies and the the part inside of the zero represented what was inside of them. Here are some samples from second grade: 

 
 


Some kids struggled more than others to find their inner strengths, but once they got going, they had a nice list of strengths. I loved seeing the bodies they came up with, too!

This weekend Student Council is working with the Oak Hill Rotary Club to raise money to purchase clean drinking water for schools in Kenya. We will be at the Barnes and Noble on Brodie Ln. from open to close Saturday- Sunday passing out flyers with a code that will get us a percentage of every purchase. You should have received one of these flyers last week, but in case you didn't, the code is: 11564325 
You can use this code at any Barnes and Noble location this Saturday and Sunday, but we will only be at the Brodie Ln. location and there will also be a magician at the Brodie Ln. location at 10:00 am on Saturday, so bring out your family and support our cause!! If you can't make it to a physical location, you can also use our code online at www.BN.com/bookfairs, so tell all your family and friends, even if they are in another state because they can purchase online!

Each LifeStraw that we are able to purchase will be enough to provide clean water for a child in Kenya for an entire year. Please help our Student Council make a difference!




Thank you and have a great weekend! :-)