Law Day Teaching Tip

You probably remember May Day on May 1 but did you know that Law Day is celebrated on that same date?! Here are some suggestions for celebrating:

1. Invite a local congressperson to visit your school, grade group, or classroom. Have your class write down questions beforehand, vote on the best, choose an interviewer, and conduct the visit like an interview. This procedure will review thinking, writing, democratic responsibility, and speaking. HINT: If you videotape the visit, your class can view it while you are preparing cumulative folders at the end of the year! It would also serve to show your absentees on that day what transpired.

2. If you are parents, take your children, depending upon their ages, to a town or city hall meeting.

3. Take a field trip to a police station or town/city hall. Have the person you see talk about making laws and the consequences of breaking them.

4. Discuss the reasons to have laws, why people break laws, and punishments they should receive for breaking them.

5. Read about recent local and national laws. How are they similar and different? Try making a Venn Diagram. Could you make a bulletin board of them?

6. For those of you dealing with difficult children, ask your school's guidance counsellor for local groups that can help.

I hope these FREE TEACHING TIPS have inspired your own ideas. Remember that Reading is FUNdamental!

Freda J. Glatt, MS, retired from teaching after a 34-year career in Early-Childhood and Elementary Education. Her focus, now, is to reach out and help others reinforce reading comprehension and develop a love for reading. Visit her site at http://www.sandralreading.comReading is FUNdamental!