- A TeachersFirst holiday lesson based on Shel Silverstein's book The Giving Tree.
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Giving Tree Lesson - A TeachersFirst holiday lesson based on Shel Silverstein's book The Giving Tree. |
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Click here to see your students' responses. We'd like to read your students' responses to the Giving Tree lesson. We'll post selected responses on TeachersFirst's own Giving Tree, which will be up for everyone - especially students, parents, and grandparents - to visit during the holidays. Click the link above for instructions on contributing. |
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Grade level
This lesson can be adapted for use with students of varying ability levels in grades 3 - 8.
Synopsis
After reading and discussing the book The Giving Tree, students reflect and write about the gift they would most like to give.
Procedure
Ask students to bring in scraps of holiday wrapping paper to use as part of the lesson. Ideally, these should be heavy wrapping paper with a white reverse side. Begin the lesson by reading the story The Giving Tree to the class. After reading the story, discuss it with the class, making sure that as many students as possible have a chance to describe the meaning they find in the story.
After the discussion, explain to the students that they will be composing their own "gifts" to hang on a giving tree in the classroom. Have each student cut a piece of wrapping paper about seven inches square, folding it in half like a small greeting card. Then ask the students to think about the gift that they would most like to give and the person or people to whom they would like to give it.
Students should begin the assignment by writing a "sloppy copy" which they can revise until they have a finished version of their answer. Have students copy the finished answers to the wrapping paper "cards," then share them with other members of the class. When the presentations are finished, hang the cards in the pyramid shape of a tree on a classroom bulletin board. Hang the cards by attaching the inside sheet, so that passers-by can open them and read the messages inside.
Note
Teachers should expect that some students will respond to this assignment in very concrete terms, while others will give more abstract responses. You may want to emphasize that this is not an assignment with one right answer, and that gifts of all sorts can be important.
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