Lesson 4: Rules and Citizenship

**Kindergarten**

**Key Concept 1:**

**Rules and Citizenship Lesson**

**Overview:**

Students will learn through primary sources the chain of command
that we all must live under. Students will consider rules and laws starting
with their homes and then moving to the school, city, state and federal
government. They will discuss the rules in each form of government. Students
will then think about rules they believe should be in effect at their home or
school, and write proposals for those rules to be presented. The lesson plan is
set up into five 15 to 30 minute segments. The teacher can teach more than one
a day if necessary.

**For the Teacher:**

This lesson is very straight forward. The only
changes that you might need to make are updates in the photos for the Arkansas
State Governor and the U.S. President.

**Materials**
Needed:

·
Packet (included)

·
Computer with projector or printed pictures and maps

·
Construction paper

·
Coloring utensils (e.g. crayons, colored pencils,
or markers…)

**Key Vocabulary:**

Capitol

Congress

Consequence

Rule

Citizen

Community

**Objectives:**

C.1.K.2
Describe the role of a school and its leaders.

C.3.K.1
Recognize the need for rules and consequences

C.3.K.2
Discuss ways people improve communities

C.3.K.3
Discuss the importance of problem solving related to classroom issues

E.4.K.2
Explain reasons behind a personal decision

1. Give students the **This is my House** coloring page. Ask students to color this house like
their house. Add flowers, trees, windows and doors as they desire.

2. Next, walk students through a
discussion of some of the rules they have at their homes. Drawing attention to
how many are similar and how some are different.

3. Pass out **Who’s in charge at**
my house? **Ask students to draw a picture of who is in charge at their**
house.

4. Review the rules that were placed on the board, and ask
students to write one or more rules from their home. Answers will vary.

*Day 2:*

1. Give students **This is my Classroom**. Ask students to write their name in the box.
Next, have students pick one other person in the room (introduce the word
partner if needed) and to write their name in the other box. You may also have
them draw themselves and their partner sitting correctly in their desks.

2. Then, share with the students a
picture of yourself (the teacher). Discuss with them how the teacher is in
charge of the classroom and he/she is there to take care of them and to make
the decisions.

3. Give the students the worksheet
named **This is my Teacher**. Let the students draw a picture of you. If you choose
to have your printed picture available for the students to look at, then omit
the coloring activity.

4. After the discussion, ask students to look at the classroom
rules. These may be your rules or the ones they came up with. Discuss any
changes that should be made. Make changes as you see fit.

*Day 3:*

1. Share with students a picture
of your school and your principal.

2. Optional activity to having
actual pictures of your school might be to have the students draw and color the
picture called **This is my school.**

3. Discuss with the students that
the school is like our home. We have to take care of it.

4. Next, discuss with them that
the principal is in charge of the school and that you as a teacher, and they,
as students, must answer to him.

5. Finally, discuss some of the
rules that students must follow in school. Explain to them why these rules are
important. (Optional sidewalk chalk activity of four way intersection using
stop signs and demonstrating using the rules and disobeying the rules to show
importance—the children find it fun to bump into each other while running the
stop signs so make sure to explain that someone could easily get hurt,
especially if they were in a car).

6. Finish today’s activity with a
tour of the school. Make sure to point out important locations such as:
library, music room, office, gym, lunch room, etc.

7. If time allows, upon returning to the room, distribute **This**
is my Principal **and have students draw a picture of the principal.**

*Day 4:*

1. Review with your students rules
at home, rules in the classroom, rules in the school and who is in charge in
each situation.

2. Start your discussion with either a US map or Google Earth,
looking at their school, city and then introduce the state.

3. Share with students a picture of the current
governor, and the Arkansas State
Capitol(go ahead and google it right in front of them.  It is important that they learn how to look
information up on their own and this a great model to use in your classroom on
a regular basis.  “Class, what should I
type in to search for…”).

4. Next, discuss
with them that the governor is in charge of the state. Explain to them that he
has helpers to make the laws of our state and they are a group of people called
the State Congress.

5. Finally, discuss some of the rules that
citizens of Arkansas must follow.

*Day 5:*

1. Once again
review the rules at home, the classroom, the school, the rules of Arkansas and
who is in charge in each situation.

2. Start your
discussion with either a US map or Google Earth, looking at their school, city,
state and now the nation.

3. Share with
students a picture of the current president and the U.S. Capitol

4. Next, discuss
with them that the president is in charge of the whole country. Explain to them
that he has helpers to make the laws of our country and they are a group of
people we call Congress.

5. Finally,
discuss some of the rules that citizens of the United States must follow.

6. Ask students to get into groups to discuss a
law they think our school or classroom needs to have. Ask students to write it
on a piece of construction paper as a group. Then present it to the class
during a group time.

**Assessment:**

Evaluate the
student’s ability to follow directions through teacher observation.

The teacher can
also observe and evaluate the student’s fine motor skills through the coloring
and writing pages.

The teacher can
observe and evaluate the student’s ability to follow classroom and school rules
and work with others.

Students can be given a **Presentation Rubric** score
based on their ability to present their law to the group and explain why they
think it should be a law.