My Strengths

Lesson Content

• Lesson Plan Template:

  CTE Lesson Plan

• CTE Course Info and Benchmark Notes

  
  

  Program Title (as applicable): N/A

  Course Title: Kindergarten

  Course Number: N/A

  Career Cluster: N/A

  CIP Number: N/A

  Course Type: General Education 

   

• Unit Outline

  
  

  This lesson can be situated within an All About Me, Celebrating Diversity or similar unit at the beginning of the year. The unit would be focused on learning about ourselves as well as other students in class, with discussions about how students are alike and different. Various activities might include sorting students by birthday, graphing favorite colors, writing about families and so forth.

   

• Career Connection

  
  

  As students discuss and identify their personal strengths, they will grow self-awareness and self-confidence skills. These skills are impactful in career building in accepting and applying performance feedback, embracing opportunities for growth and development, and seeking opportunities to apply personal strengths.   

   

• Learning Objectives

  
  

  Students will be able to:

  • Identify a personal strength
  • Write and or dictate information about their identified personal strength
  • Draw a picture related to their identified personal strength

   

• Prior Knowledge

  
  

  Students should be familiar with:

  • Grade-level high frequency words
  • Print knowledge skills

   

• Guiding Questions

  
  
  • What is one of your personal strengths?

   

• Procedure

  
  
  1. To introduce the lesson, show students a piece of rope, string, or twine as you have available. Ask students, “What can I do with this rope (twine/string)?” Have students share and discuss all of the different things you can do with a piece of rope (i.e. tie a knot, tie two things together, lay it on the ground to make a circle, play jump rope, make a bracelet, help carry something, help move something heavy, etc.).
     • Explain that the rope (twine/string) has many different strengths, or there are many different things it can do.
     • Address any misconceptions about the term strength. Having strength can mean that you are physically strong, but strength can also mean something that you are good at or something that you can do all by yourself.
  2. Next, ask students to give examples of things that they are good at, or things that are their strengths. List the ideas on chart paper or the white board. Student names do not need to be connected to each idea unless the teacher wants. This time can be used for brainstorming.
     • Try adding a small drawing next to each, for example, a shoe next to “tie my shoes” for visual reminders of what is written. When making the list, keep the following sentence frame in mind so that the ideas on the list fit within the frame, “My name is _____ and I can _____ all by myself.”
  3. Have students identify one of their own personal strengths. Highlight that it should be something that they can do all by themselves.
  4. Introduce the sentence frame, “My name is ____ and I can ____ all by myself.” On chart paper or the white board, model for students how to fill in the sentence frame with the teacher's name and one of the ideas listed. Have the students read back the sentence frame to the teacher with the sight words.
  5. Use either the My Strengths handout attachment or the My Strengths sentence frame attachment to have students complete the handout or create a poster. See Teacher Notes for more information. With either option, students will fill in the sentence frame and add a drawing of themselves completing the personal strength task.
  6. To bring the lesson to a close, have student volunteers share their personal strengths.

• Teacher Notes

  
  
  • Teachers can use either the My Strengths handout or the My Strengths sentence frame attachment. The My Strengths handout includes space for drawing and writing within the sentence frame. The My Strengths sentence frame contains the sentence frame to be printed, cut out, and pasted onto a larger poster if desired.

   

• Optional

  
  

  Formative Assessment

  • Teachers can use the written responses to assess print writing skills.
  • Teachers can ask students to read their responses, assessing for sight word fluency within the sentence frame (I, can, my, and, is, all).

  Accommodation Suggestions:

  • Teachers can choose to leave the list of ideas up, or challenge students to attempt their own spelling. Teachers can write students’ identified strengths on separate pieces of paper for individual reference. Teachers can also allow dictations of strengths as needed.