On November 11, we celebrate Veterans Day. For most classrooms, this is an important but not so challenging holiday to address. But, as with all things in special education, we need to take a different approach. We cannot assume our students have the previous knowledge, or even the vocabulary, to fully appreciate the meaning of this day. So, how can you ensure your students fully understand and appreciate the importance of Veterans Day? Let’s take a closer look. At the end of this post, I have a writing prompt you can download for free to use with your students on November 11.
1. Examine the history
I like to make sure my students appreciate where traditions and celebrations came from. This is also true for Veterans Day. Of course, I like to make a book. It doesn’t have to be super fancy, and it should be at your students’ reading and comprehension level.
If making a book does not fit with your time frame, how about a video? A quick search on YouTube will bring up many short videos that teach your students about the history of this holiday.
Here are some good ones I found:
- https://youtu.be/ymCa1eB_qLA
- https://youtu.be/oqgrkeZZe3g
- https://youtu.be/c-qxrCRfcS4
- https://youtu.be/mWD4Oy6fKlo
2. Address the vocabulary
Many of your students may not understand what it truly means to be a veteran. It is a word that may be unfamiliar and hold little to no meaning for them. For this reason, I decided to create a whole second book to deepen their understanding of the word veteran. I knew this would also benefit me when it came to teaching about Memorial Day in May.
Don’t forget a vocabulary board! These are so valuable. Once you and your students get used to using them, you will feel lost without them. A vocabulary board is simply a set of picture symbols that relate directly to the topic you are teaching. Students can then use those symbols in class discussions, activities, and even assessments. Don’t be fooled into thinking your students don’t need them or are too advanced. When learning new information, we want to remove as many barriers as possible, and communication is a big one for this population. Struggling to find the right word when asking or answering a question is quickly eliminated by using a vocabulary board. If you put the time in once, you can use them year after year.
This is also the perfect time to involve a student’s family. Perhaps someone in their family is a veteran. That familiarity will help deepen the student’s understanding of this word and its impact on them personally. I came up with an easy family involvement activity that was very popular with my students. All you have to do is reach out and ask parents if there is a veteran in the family they would like honored in a classroom ceremony. Parents will hopefully talk about this with their child, and then send in a star with that family member’s name and, if possible, a picture. All of those stars will end up decorating your classroom door in the first half of November.
3. Reinforce with lots of activities
We all know our students need a lot of repetition (preferably with variety) to fully master new material. There was no way my students could learn and remember everything I wanted them to about this holiday with only one day’s worth of lessons.
First, I reinforced the content of the books I had written by having students “take notes” on the key points. Since most of my students were non-readers and almost none of them could write legibly, I found that circle maps using pictures were the best way for them to independently record this information. I always had 2 versions available. One circle map would be errorless. Students just needed to cut out the pictures and place them in the circle. The other circle map had incorrect answers (distractors) mixed in. This was perfect for my older and higher-level students.
I like to integrate a theme across as many subjects as possible to help students generalize. So, we did some patterns in math that used common picture symbols from the unit.
I also wanted to reinforce calendar and number skills. So simply being able to find the correct date (November 11) on a calendar was a perfect addition to my lesson plan.
I am not always a big “arts and crafts” person, but we did add some to this unit, and my kiddos loved doing them. I had one for my students who could cut and paste on their own, and one for those who could not.
By now, you know I love writing prompts. They are an errorless way for students to freely communicate something they have learned about the material. You can get this writing prompt for free by clicking the button below.
4. Assessment
Hopefully, preassessment was the very first step in your process. I love giving my assessment to students prior to starting a unit. That way, not only do I have a clear understanding of what they know, but I also have a way to measure their growth. This unit was short, so I opted for a simple close worksheet. It worked great.
I truly believe that with this format, your students will not only have some cute artwork to take home but also a deeper, more personal connection to this holiday. Of course, you can get my entire unit on Veterans Day. Just click HERE to check it out.
