They cut a safety belt from colored paper and decorate it with car safety rules we've discussed. Kids wear their belts home with notes they've written to their parents about family car safety. My students help the needy throughout the year with food and necessity drives. I ask parent volunteers to help deliver the donated items. My students really like reading to their adopted friends.
Students also make audiocassettes of their stories to loan to the homes or centers.
To start students thinking about our global trash problem, I ask them to count the bags of trash their families discard during one week. We calculate a class average and use it to estimate how many bags of trash our school discards, as well as our town, county, and state. Students graph these estimations. Then I divide the class into groups and have kids develop creative ways to reduce trash. To launch a trash crusade in your classroom, use the Trash Talk reproducible included with this unit.