Overview: What key behaviors are tied to success in the content area you teach? Help your students explore what those behaviors and attitudes look, feel and sounds like. You could have a future scientist or artist on your hands and they don’t even know it!
To access the video recording of the webinar detailing this lesson, please click here.
Materials Needed:
- The “Defining Your Skills” Table and Content Area Skills (provided)
Learning Outcomes:
- Students will learn transferable concepts that are applicable across grade levels and content areas.
- Students will develop habits and attitudes that sustain effort and accomplishment both in and out of the classroom setting.
Learning Objectives:
By the end of the activity, students will be able to…
- Utilize the shared language to build a culture of learning.
- Define “key terms” to connect content areas with academic success, cultural understanding, interpersonal communication, decision-making, specific attitudes and transferable skills.
Directions:
- Preparation: Choose 5 “key terms” from the list below or come up with own based on learning goals or content area.
- Give each student a copy of the “Defining Your Skills” handout to complete. This can be done in a Google form or other similar program if virtual delivery is necessary.)
- Have students share their work on the desired educational platform/tool (if necessary for virtual delivery).
- Have students compare and contrast their work.
- Extension: Have students keep a daily or weekly journal to track the progress and development of their “new skills/traits”.
Discussion:
- What did you observe about other students’ explanations of the “key terms”?
- What similarities or commonalities did you observe?
- What did you learn about yourself?
- What did you learn about others?
- How can the “key terms” help us to succeed in school and in life?
- How can the “key terms” help us to better understand and communicate with others?
- How can the “key terms” help us better understand our own and others’ cultural values?
“Key Terms” across content areas:
- Art: Creativity, artistry, curiosity, imagination, innovation, personal expression
- Business: Economic/financial literacy, entrepreneurialism, motivation,
- College & Career: Critical thinking, career-ready, prepared, learning, understanding
- English Language Arts: Research skills/practices, investigating, questioning, critiquing
- General: Perseverance, self-direction, planning, self-discipline, adaptability, initiative
- General: Imagination, curiosity, self-awareness, strength, enjoyment, adaptability
- Health/Wellness: Physical health, mental health, nutrition, dedicated, active
- Higher Order Thinking: Critical thinking, problem-solving, reasoning, analysis, interpretation, synthesizing information
- Leadership: Leadership, teamwork, collaboration, cooperation
- Mathematics: Reasoning, modeling, perseverance, precision, abstract
- Science: Scientific literacy/reasoning, hypothesizing, observing, classifying, predicting, inferring, evaluating
- Social Emotional Learning: Self-awareness, self-management, social-awareness, responsible decision-making, relationship skills
- Social Studies: Civics, ethical, social justice, citizenship
- Speech/Debate: Oral/written communication, public speaking, presenting, listening, fluency
- World History/Culture: Global awareness, multicultural literacy, humanitarianism, community, culture, cooperation, collaboration
- World Language: Fluency, interpersonal, intercultural, communicative, comprehensible
This lesson is adapted from an idea at Solution Tree.
For more lesson plan ideas, please visit the AFS-USA Teacher’s Toolbox.
For questions, comments or suggestions, please email us at [email protected].