1 I. Content: Describe what it is you will teach. What is the content? Students will be looking at the Statue of Liberty and thinking about what it meant to immigrants. Along with looking at pictures and short clip of this famous landmark, students will be reading quotes from immigrants who saw the Statue of Liberty for the first time. II. Learning Goal(s): Describe what specifically students will know and be able to do after the experience of this class. Students will know and be able to: Recognize the Statue or Liberty as a famous landmark Observe and question primary source documents Realize why the Statue of Liberty is an important landmark to many immigrants from the past, present, and future III. Rationale: Explain how the content and learning goal(s) relate to your Curriculum Unit Plan learning goals. Students have been learning about immigration into the United States. The Statue or Liberty serves as a monument that almost all children can recognize. Many students just know that The Statue of Liberty is a monument in New York City; this lesson is designed to look at the deeper meaning of her and what it meant for immigrants coming into New York. An major objective of this unit is to get students to learn how to think empathetically; to be able to understand how immigrants felt during the immigration process as a whole (why they left, what they went through to get here, how it was living in America). By introducing the Statue of Liberty as more of a freedom figure rather than just a monument you can visit, students will be thinking about how immigrants first felt when coming to America. The essential questions Why do people leave their homes? is incorporated into this lesson but letting students explore how various people felt about seeing the Statue for the first time. IV. Assessment: Describe how you and your students will know they have reached your learning goals. Find the location of The Statue of Liberty on a map Analyze and conceptualize primary source documents/first hand experiences (quotes) Find and discuss what The Statue of Liberty meant for immigrants coming into the United States. V. Personalization: Describe how you will provide for individual student strengths and needs. How will you and your lesson consider the needs of each student and scaffold learning?
2 IMMIGRATION LAP 4 Students will be paired off for the beginning of the lesson so students can express ideas and possible meanings for the Statue of Liberty. While pre-watching the video, I made sure to pause at specific spots in order to for students to process what is being shown to them; guided questions will be used in order for students to do so. Articles were printed out for each pair; the grouping was pre-selected to make sure higher-level readers were paired off with students who struggle. Students will able to work together to underline important information about immigrants and the Statue of Liberty. Many students will benefit from partner work because they will be able to piggyback off of each other rather than just going right into the writing activity Quotes were spoken and written as a guide for students into why the Statue meant so much to immigrants. VI. Activity description and agenda: Describe the activities that will help your students understand the content of your class lesson by creating an agenda with time frames for your class. Be prepared to explain why you think each activity will help students on the path toward understanding. Time Student Teacher 11:50-12:15 Discuss what they know about Ask students what they know The Statue of Liberty and where they think it is on the about The Statue of Liberty and where it stands on a map. map. Watch clip. Discuss what Locate her on map. Explain to they think about the quotes and narration in clip about immigrants and statue. students we will be looking at a short clip from the History Channel that explains how immigrants felt during the statue of liberty. 12:15-12:20 Listen to excerpt. Turn and talk to partner. Have students discuss When Jessie Came Across the Sea. Read page when Jessie saw the Statue of Liberty for the first time. Have students turn and talk about how Jessie felt seeing the statue of liberty
3 Time Student Teacher 12:20-12:30 Work with partner to underline important information. Pass out Statue of Liberty article. Explain that we will be looking at the statue and what it stood for when immigrants saw her for the first time.. Have students underline important information from article that pertains to immigrants. 12:15-12:30 Listen to teacher. Discuss the article. Explain that an immigrant wrote the poem on the Statue and we will be discussing the poem during Poetry inside and Out in the next week. 12:30-12:40 Work alone on exit slip. Use quotes to help think about immigrants feelings. Pass out exit slip to students. Have them work alone. Walking around to assist. Place quotes on tables and rotate quotes when needed. VII. List the Massachusetts Learning Standards this lesson addresses. 4.15 Describe the diverse nature of the American people by identifying the distinctive contributions to American culture of: C. Major European immigrant groups who have come to America, locating their countries of origin and where they tended to settle in large numbers (e.g., English, Germans, Italians, Scots, Irish, Jews, Poles, and Scandinavians). VIII. Reflection RL.4.2 Determine a theme of a story, drama, or poem from details in the text; summarize the text.
4 IMMIGRATION LAP 4 a. In light of all areas of planning, but especially in terms of your stated purpose and learning goals, in what ways was the activity(ies) successful? How do you know? In what ways was it not successful? How might the activity be planned differently another time? b. What did you learn from the experience of this lesson that will inform your next LAP? During this lesson there were many highlights and unsuccessful moments. The overall goal of this lesson was to get students to think about the Statue of Liberty in terms of a symbol and not just an historical monument that can be visited. It had to be stated several times that this lesson was not to look at how and when the Statue of Liberty was built. Once students understood that this lesson was connecting to immigration, they were able to refrain from asking questions pertaining to the Statue or Liberty s history and focused on what the Statue meant to immigrants coming to America. Some students could not think past Ellis Island, and people feeling nervous and scared about passing the inspection. Various exit slips showed that students thought people were nervous to see the Statue because of what lies ahead. Although this is a great connection, students were not understanding that this was the first thing immigrants saw when coming into America, they were happy and joyous to be in free from the troubles in their homelands. Some slips talked about how they were nervous to pass the inspection, and scared they would get sent back home. Many wrote about how the Statue symbolized freedom, which showed they were making connections to the article, video, and quotes that were shown. I wish there were more videos and quote about immigrants seeing the Stature of Liberty for the first time. It took a while to find quotes that would help my students understand what the Statue symbolized. If planned differently, I would have students work in small groups and look at each quote carefully and video as stations. I feel as if this would have helped students better understand what the Statue actually meant. When it came to talking about emotions, I would have students talk about what they thought first before writing in down to ensure they understood that not all immigrants were not thinking about the inspection, they were initially happy that they made it to America.
5 The Context of the Statue of Liberty The statue is a gift to America from the people of France. Its original name is Liberty Enlightening the World. The statue represents the idea of Liberty. Liberty, Sam Adams wrote, is...first, a right to life; second, to Liberty (Freedom); third, to prosperity; When the Americans secured these ideas with revolution, other countries were encouraged to fight for their freedom. And since then, millions of people have immigrated to the United States of America. From 1892 to 1954, twelve million immigrants passed through Ellis Island into New York. Today, over 100 million living Americans are descendants of immigrants who entered the United States through Ellis Island. Since 1886, the Statue of Liberty has stood near Ellis Island in New York Harbor. At the base of the statue is a poem, The New Colossus by Emma Lazarus. In the poem, the statue is referred to as the Mother of Exiles. An exile is someone who has left his own country either voluntarily or by force. The Statue of Liberty has welcomed millions of immigrants who have left their own countries to seek a new and better life in America. Throughout America s history, people have immigrated to the United States for several reasons: The most popular reason for coming to America has been economic opportunity. The hope of finding a better life in the United States has brought generations of immigrants here. Copyright American Heritage Education Foundation, www.americanheritage.org
Name: 6 Date: IMMIGRATION LAP 4 Immigration Why do people leave their homes? Statue of Liberty What did the Statue of Liberty symbolize or mean to immigrants coming into America? Please explain your answer. Name: Date: Immigration Why do people leave their homes? Statue of Liberty What did the Statue of Liberty symbolize or mean to immigrants coming into America? Please explain your answer.
7 I saw the Statue of Liberty, and I said to myself Lady, you re beautiful. You opened your arms and you get all the foreigners here. Give me a chance to prove that I am worth it, to do something to become somebody in America Greek immigrant Doukanie Papandreos
8 IMMIGRATION LAP 4 The bigness of Mrs. Liberty overcame us. No one spoke a work, for she as a goddess and we knew she represented the big, powerful country which was to be our future home Polish Immigrant
9 When I saw the Statue of Liberty.it was something beautiful. I knew I was in America I knew I was going to see my father.i had somebody to love -14 year old Italian immigrant Victor Tartarini