These Learning Links provide ten quick-and-easy, five-minute mini-lessons to promote student thought and dialogue about service and civic engagement. You may use as many of them as you wish, and in whatever order best meets your needs and the interest of your students. The purpose of these mini-lessons is to provide a deeper understanding of philanthropy (the giving of time, talent, and treasure for the common good) and to reinforce the lesson focus. These Learning Links also promote the development of character traits, civic engagement, and student leadership. As appropriate to your grade level, it is recommended that students play an active leadership role in presenting these mini-lessons to their classmates.

1. Read: Aaron did not feel well. He told his mother that he felt sick. She took his temperature and he had a fever. Mother called the doctor. The told her what medicine to get for Aaron. He also told her that Aaron should not go to school for three days. Aaron felt sad. He would miss being in his class play. He was supposed to be an elephant. The next day his teacher had to find someone new to be the elephant. The boys and girls were sad to hear that Aaron was sick. In art class they asked their art teacher if they could make cards to send to him. The art teacher thought that was a good idea. Everyone made a card and told Aaron that they missed him. They also told him to get better real soon.
   
   Discuss: When people get sick, they have to miss doing some things until they get better. What are some things you have had to miss when you didn’t feel well?  How do you think Aaron will feel when he gets all the cards from his classmates? How do you think the people who get the cards we make will feel?
   
    
2. Read: Anytime you make something it can be called art. Baking cookies is an art. Drawing or coloring is an art. Building something out of blocks is an art. Writing a poem or singing a song is an art. Being able to do these things is called a talent. It takes talent to make art. Talent is something everybody has. Everybody can create art.
   
   Discuss: Our current service project has us using our talent to create art. Why is it important that we all share our talent to make things to give to other people?
   
    
3. Read: The teacher asked the class to think of as many kind words as they could. As the students called out their words, she wrote them on the board. The boys and girls came up with words like love, thanks, please, you first, you’re my friend, I’m sorry, and I’ll help you. The teacher asked the class to use some of these words on their cards and letters that they were creating.
   
   Discuss:  How do you feel when someone uses kind words when talking to you? Why do you think the teacher asked the boys and girls to use some of these words on the cards and letters they make for their service project?
   
    
4. Read: How do you “thank” someone for something they did for you? Sometimes it’s not ease to thank them face-to-face because they live far away. You may have to call them or write to them. Talking to them is easier. Writing to may be harder to do. Maybe you can’t write very well yet or the words that you want to say you don’t know how to spell yet. When Amy wanted to “thank” her grandmother for her birthday gift, she drew a “happy face” on a piece of paper and had her mother mail it.
   
   Discuss: What do you think Amy was trying to tell her grandmother by drawing her a “happy face”? Do you think that grandmother knew how Amy felt about her gift by looking at the “happy face” Amy drew for her? Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words! What other pictures could we draw to tell people how we feel during our service project? 
5. Read: On each of our hands we have five fingers. Our fingers can help us remember how to be helpful. Our thumbs can remind us to work and be strong. Our pointing finger can show us the way to go. Our tallest finger can remind us to always watch where we are going.  Our “ring” finger can remind us of our promise to help and our little finger can remind us that ever little bit helps.
   
   Discuss: How will our fingers be helpful to us during our artist service project? Like our little fingers, why is it important to do what we can to be helpful even if it doesn’t seem like much?
   
    
6. Read: A flower is a beautiful thing. We might like one flower better than another. We may think that one flower is prettier than another or that it smells better than another; but all flowers have two things that are the same. They have a stem and a root. Without them the flower would not be pretty or smell nice. The flower would dry up and die. The stem and root make it possible for the flower to be beautiful and smell good. When we do nice things for people it’s like giving them a beautiful flower that smells good. But if we do nothing there will be no beautiful flower that smells good to give.
   
   Discuss: How is our service project like giving someone a beautiful flower smells good? What do we have to do to make sure that the flower we give is a beautiful and smells good?
   
    
7. Read: Carlos was learning to ride his bike. Uncle Juan was helping him. He held the bike and ran along-side while Carlos steered. Uncle Juan noticed that Carlos was steering fine. But he also noticed that Carlos was not pedaling his bike. He was just letting Uncle Juan push him. “Hey,” his uncle said to Carlos, “you have to pedal if you want to learn to ride a bicycle and get somewhere!”
   
   Discuss: If we want our service project to be fun and get us somewhere, what do we have to do? Is it okay for someone to help us?
   
    
8. Read: Carrie had a favorite teddy bear that she always carried with her around the house. She even slept with it next to her at night. She told her mother one day that her teddy was her very best friend. It made her happy and feel safe. Mother smiled. She remembered a picture that Carrie had drawn for her at school. She had carefully tucked it away in a special box. In this box, mother  kept things that were special to her. It also contained a lock of Carrie’s hair. A letter from Aunt Jayne. A picture of the entire family during the holiday. An old locket that her grandmother had given her. And a ribbon she had won when she was five. All these things made mother feel happy and safe.
   
   Discuss: Do you think the things that mother kept would be things that you would keep? Why do you think these things made mother feel happy and safe? Do you think the cards and letters we make and send to people will make them feel happy and safe?
   
    
9. Read: Karrie asked her friend Lacey to come to her house to play. They had fun until Lacey’s mother called and said that it was time to come home for dinner. Karrie wanted Lacey to stay a little longer. She asked her mom if Lacey could stay for dinner. Her mother said that would be fine if it was okay with Lacey’s mother. Lacey’s mother said that it was okay. Later that night when Lacey was at home, her mother asked her if she thanked Karrie’s mother for letting her stay for dinner. Lacey told her that she forgot to say thank you.
   
   Discuss: What do you think Lacey should do?  When she asked her mother what she should do, her mother told her that it would be nice if she would write a “thank you” note to Karrie’s mom. What do you think Lacey should say in her “thank you” note? How is our service project a chance  to say “thank you” to people we forgot to thank?
   
    
10. Read: Eric was sad. His best friend’s puppy ran away. It had been lost for over a week. Eric felt like he wanted to do something to cheer up his friend. After school one day he had an idea. He rushed home and up to his room. With crayons and colored pencils he drew a picture of his friend’s dog. Along the bottom of the picture he wrote the word LOST. The next day he handed it to his friend. “Here,” he said. “You can post this on a tree by your house. Maybe someone has seen your puppy and will return it.” Eric’s friend looked at the picture and began to laugh. “This doesn’t look anything like my puppy.” He laughed some more. Then Eric started to laugh too.
    
    Discuss: Eric wanted to cheer up his friend. Do you think he did? Do you think Eric felt badly that his friend laughed at his picture? How are we hoping our cards and letters will make people feel?
     

Reflection plays a very important role in promoting student learning. The following suggested activities are ways to help students reflect on their learning after they have participated in a service event.  Choose one or more of the activities most appropriate to the service event and your students.


ACTIVITY ONE:
Have the students share what they know about quilts (e.g. they are warm, soft, cuddly, usually made out of pieces of materials sewn together, etc)  as you provide the students with 4 ¼” by 5 ½” sheet of paper-- an 8 ½” x 11” sheet of paper cut in half.  Tell the students that they will be helping to make a “quilt” and that each person will contribute one piece to be added to the quilt. Have each student draw a picture of what they did during the event activity using crayons or markers.  When they have completed their drawings have them take turns bringing their “quilt piece” to you and telling the class about their drawing which will then be added to the “quilt.”  Display the “quilt” as it is being sewn together to form a “Caring Blanket.” When everyone has contributed their piece to the blanket, ask the students how their “Caring Blanket” may have made someone feel warm inside.

ACTIVITY TWO:
Provide each student with a yellow cutout of a happy face and a sad face. Have the students decide which face represents how they felt as they were helping during the activity.  Have each student bring their chosen “face” to the display area entitled “Our Faces”/”Our Helping Mirror.”  As the students hand you their “faces” display them in as much of a circle as you can.  When everyone’s face is displayed, ask the students if most of the faces were happy or sad. Using black heavy string or yarn and common pins/tacks, make the mouth of the face, over the ‘sea of faces’ that represents how the majority of the students felt.

ACTIVITY THREE:
Playing the game “Duck, Duck, Goose,” model for the students how the person who is “IT” will walk around the circle of students tapping them lightly on the head saying, “caring” “sharing” “helping” “giving,” or any combination of these words.  However when the person who is IT taps someone on the head and says “philanthropy” or “philanthropist” that person is now IT and must stand and tell the class how he or she cared, shared, helped, or gave to someone during the event.  The new IT person now walks around the circle following the model.  If some is dubbed “Philanthropist” and they have nothing they can think of to share, have the IT person continue to follow the model until he or she finds someone to be IT who is willing and able to share.  (NOTE: Make every effort to be sure that everyone has an opportunity to be IT and to share.)

ACTIVITY FOUR:
Cut out an outline of a star on yellow construction paper for each student.  Have each student come to the front of the class in turn and whisper to you what they did during the event.  Write what they did on their star.  Have the student hold up his/her star while you tell the class the word(s) that is written on it.  Celebrate each recipient as they hold their star with hand clapping/a cheer, etc.  Have each student then place his or her star on the display board entitled “Super Stars.”  After everyone has had a turn, ask the class if they think that the stars in the sky help to make things a little brighter at night. Draw a comparison as to how all of their deeds certainly helped to make the world a brighter place.  Thank and applaud the students as a class.