Category: lesson plans

LESSON PLAN 4 – PROMISE

What does it mean to make a promise? What promises have you made to yourself or to others? Are you good at keeping your promises? What happens if you break a promise? How does it feel?

This week I have been thinking about what it means to make and keep promises to myself. I made a commitment that I would be creating, implementing, and posting lesson plans on a weekly basis. Experiencing illness the way I have been, has made me rethink this promise. I’ve actually had to ‘break’ my promise for the purpose of taking care of and healing myself.

I’ve learned a lot about the ability to recognize if the promises I am keeping are actually serving a larger purpose. These past few weeks, in having to let go of my vision for weekly content on EduSpirit, I have felt mixed emotions. On one hand, I have felt like I am breaking my promise to all of you who are following these lessons and are interested in trying them out at home. On the other hand, I have realized that I have to prioritize my commitments. My commitment to health and wellness is more important right now than video recording lessons and contributing to this website using the schedule I had been following. That said, my promise to follow through with my initial commitment of 40 vBlogs still holds, even if their production takes much longer than originally anticipated.

I hope that you and your family enjoy these lessons that my family and I have been co-creating and sharing together. Thank you for your continued encouragement and support. – Cristina

LESSON PLAN – PROMISE

Please remember to cite the lesson plan if you use it for a more public venue by attributing the material to: Cristina Santamaría Graff, eduspirit.org. Thank you!

Weeks 6-7_PROMISE lesson DOWNLOAD LESSON PLAN HERE

RESOURCES FOR LESSON 4

LINKS USED WITHIN THE LESSON PLAN

BE INTENTIONAL

Listen to the TedTalk by Alex Sheen, “Because I said I would” on making and committing to PROMISES:

Alex talks about creating PROMISE CARDS or “Because I said I would” cards. Use the template provided. The template reads, “Because I said I would.” Write down a promise on the card that you want to make to yourself or to another person. Maybe it’s been something you’ve been putting off. Then give it to someone (for safe keeping). Once you fulfill the promise (it can take a day, a week, a year…) you will ask that person for the card back and let them know you have fulfilled the promise on the card. As Alex says, “You need to earn the card back.” One you fulfill the promise, the card you receive back will remind you that you are a person of your WORD. You are someone who keeps their promise.

Check out Alex’s Facebook page and his non-profit organization, “Because I Said I Would.” https://www.facebook.com/BecauseISaidIWould/

DOWNLOAD TEMPLATE HERE

BE THOUGHTFUL AND COMPASSIONATE

For this lesson you are building off of last week’s lesson, PATH. You will be using the same game board you created as a family in Lesson 3, “Path to Wellness.” You are now going to create PROMISE cards that will be added to the other cards. These cards will be questions to prompt each player to talk about specific times in their lives where they have made commitments to themselves or to others. They will also include questions about future promises, commitments, or goals that each person is thinking about making and how to achieve them.

Please email Cristina at eduspirit.community@gmail.com if you would like to receive more examples of board game questions.

Here are some examples of PROMISE questions/prompts:

TAKE ACTION

You will create an autobiographical “topical” map by gathering the following materials (or ones you can substitute for these):

• Poster Board or Cardboard
• Clay, Playdoh, or other type of molding product
• Cotton balls
• Toothpicks and/or popsicle sticks
• Glue
• Markers and/or crayons
• Felt or fabric
• Scissors

The map will demonstrate in a visual, 3-D manner, the landscape of your life. You may focus on your entire life or on a specific timeframe. Within this map, you must add at least 3 representations/depictions of major “landmarks” (or promises/commitments you have made to yourself or another that you have achieved).

Here are examples of 2D representations from online.

In this video, we, as a family are engaged in a lesson plan in which my girls are writing their own story by creating an autobiographical map. An autobiographical map is a way to map out one’s life by choosing a “landscape” of important events that have impacted and shaped one’s trajectory. This video is a part of a series in which our family, during safe-sheltering in COVID-19 times, is working together on projects and lessons that are meaningful to us. The girls, who by the end of each week, are exhausted and frustrated by e-Learning, have demonstrated an appreciation for family-centered lesson in which we are all participating in some manner. Here, in this video, I, Cristina, am sitting at the dining room table with my daughters and am assisting them with thinking about significant events in their lives.