Vanessa M. Johnson
Injustice & Immigration
In the English and Reading classroom, students engage is discussions that enhance learning and help them to apply what they have learned to new content. Teaching the students about advocacy helps them to be able to voice their thoughts and opinions and know that they can make a difference. At my school, the issue of immigration and injustice influence the lives of many. In the lesson, the students were able to use their voice to make formulated opinions about how they feel to take action. The artifacts outlined in this section offer conversation and action related lesson components that help the students take action against injustice and immigration.
Table of Contents:
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Annotated Lesson Plan
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Warm Up Student Responses
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Lesson Texts
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Student Discussion Questions
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Injustice Discussion Footage
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Injustice Letters
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Student Reflection
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Teacher Reflection
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Annotated Lesson Plan
This lesson plan offers an introduction to conversation related advocacy. The overall objective of this lesson plan is to get students to realize injustice through the content provided to them and how they can develop a solution to it. To begin, the students engaged in the warm up activity and discussion to learn more about immigration. The students read real stories about injustice created through the immigration laws. From this, the students were able to share and discuss immigration and demonstrate change through writing letters to our president. The annotations of this lesson plan explicitly discussed how the lesson encourages student advocacy.
Warm Up Student Responses
Pictured below is two student responses. At the beginning of the lesson, I wanted to get the students to activate background knowledge by discussing what they know about immigration. "These two samples show differences in culture and perspectives. It was important for me to get the students to write how they felt to prompt discussions that navigate and challenge injustice.
Lesson Texts
To get the students to understand injustice and to come up with a possible solution to the problems with immigration, it was important to incorporate personal experiences in texts that the students can relate to. In presenting the lesson to the students, we read and watched the stories of two teens before discussing how this issue directly impacts our communities. The first text that was introduced was a letter from Maria. Maria's letter was introduced to let the students see how they have the power to take action against immigration injustice by using individual assets to navigate and challenge systemic injustices. The second story introduced was about a 40 year old man named Jorge. Jorge was deported and sent back to Mexico after spending 30 years of his life in America, leaving his job and family behind. Jorge's story was used so that students can use collective assets to navigate and challenge inequity of opportunities by working together.
Student Discussion Questions
After reading and watching the lesson texts, the students independently worked on discussion questions to ignite perspectives and to challenge the students to engage in a dialogue, where they can state their opinions and use evidence from the text to support it. The following discussion questions got the students to turn conversation related advocacy into actions that make change:
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How did DACA affect Jorge? How did the immigration laws affect him?
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In thinking about your peers, how do you now feel about the cultural differences that we have around us or in this classroom?
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What stood out to you after reading the post by Maria or listening to Jorge’s story?
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What specifically about these stories made an impression or influenced your views on this issue?
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What can you do independently or collectively to challenge this type of injustice?
Students participating in discussion.
Injustice Discussion Footage
After reading and watching stories about injustice and immigration, it was important to get the students to discuss DACA and how it truly influences the lives of all of our students. The purpose of the discussion was to make students aware of the injustices they face and to get them to advocate and voice their own opinions on issues that matter. In the video below, students are engaging in an open discussion.
Injustice Letters
When introducing advocacy to the students, having them write letters to the president about injustice was a way for me to show the students that they have the ability to make change no matter the circumstance. In the first draft pictured below the student wrote to the president about injustices that we discussed in class. Though this letter may or may not get a response, the students know that their voice means something.
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Student Reflection
At the end of each lesson, students complete the 3-2-1 Reflection questions. These questions request that the students reflect on learning. By completing these questions, the teacher knows if the students have mastered the content taught, and also provides insight of how the students feel about immigration and injustice. In the reflection below the students answered the following questions:
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Write 3 things you learned from today's lesson
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·Write 2 things you found interesting about DACA and immigration.
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Write 1 question you still have.
I believe these activities were transformational opportunities of student advocacy that was both conversation and action related. In a school where over half of the student population is Hispanic, I felt compelled to discuss the issue of immigration for the students and their families. Even if the students were not directly affected by immigration, spreading awareness and providing them the opportunity to ignite change, made the students more aware of their own power. Through the discussion and writing of the letters gave the students the power to address real world issues, and to know that they can continue to do so throughout their lives.