Making the Dream a Reality ( Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Civil Rights Unit)

I teach in a rural school district.  A good number of the students' parents and grandparents have lived in this community their entire lives.  Living and teaching in a community like this has it's advantages.  Everyone knows everyone else and in times of need, the people of this community will come together to support each other.
One disadvantage that I can name is the lack of diversity that comes from living and working in a community such as this.  There's some, but not much.  Because of this, some of the students I work with are apprehensive when it comes to diversity.  One of my goals as a teacher within this community is to expose my students to diversity even though there's not many opportunities because of our location.  One way I try to accomplish this is to study Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s life and analyze his dream.

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Dr. King's Life

I begin this unit by posting a question on my Google Classroom: What do you know about Martin Luther King Jr?  I'm not surprised to see that my students can't tell me much about Dr. King.  Most know that he gave the I Have a Dream speech, he fought for civil rights for the African Americans, and that we have a holiday in his honor.  Several of my students, however have owned up to not knowing much about him at all.  They say that they've heard of him and they know he's important, but they aren't sure why.  

After I get a feel for what if any background knowledge they have on Dr. King, we start reading biographies of his life together.  There's several nonfiction reading standards I can connect this to, but this year, I focused on text evidence.  We read through some biographies I found online that started with his birth and ended with his death.  One aspect of Dr. King's early childhood that really stood out to my students this year was that how smart he was.  Dr. King skipped a few grades in school and he went to college when he was 15.  This amazed my students because the age of 15 doesn't seem all that far away from a 12 year old.  Also, this was remarkable because my students also learned that about the school segregation at that time.  The white kids had way more opportunities because their schools were better funded than the schools the African American students were allowed to attend.  They also learned that Dr. King was inspired by Gandhi.  Most didn't know much about who Gandhi was, but we discussed how he was a political leader in India and used peaceful methods to help India become independent from Great Britain.  

Eventually, we read about the civil rights movement.  Most students clearly had no idea that things were as bad as they were for African Americans.  "You mean they couldn't sit where they wanted on a bus even if they were sitting in seat first?"  "Black people couldn't stay at hotels?"  "They couldn't even use a restroom if there was a sign that said Whites Only?"  We read about Rosa Parks' bravery on the bus and how that courageous act was like the spark that set off the civil rights movement that Dr. King was part of.  We discuss police brutality and all the violence the African American people had to endure, but what speaks volumes to the man that Dr. King was is that he wanted to fight in peace.  Yes, he wanted segregation to end, but the way he wanted it to end was by a way of peace much how Gandhi encouraged the people of India to gain their independence.  Some of the questions I ask the students at this point are "What if you were being bullied by another student and you tell the teachers and even take it to the principal, but what if they tell you that everything the student who is bullying you is doing is legal?"  The students look at me angrily like they are about to have some words with me over this imaginary incident.  I respond by saying that is how it was with the African Americans.  They were treated terribly and it was legal.  

We discuss how the peaceful protests included bus boycotts, lunch counter sit ins, and marches, which of course lead to the I Have a Dream speech.  I explain to the students that we are going to read this speech together, but while we are reading through the bios, we learn the importance and the impact of that speech.  That speech lead to the Civil Rights Act which made segregation illegal.  

What I didn't realize until I started teaching was that the battle was far from over after the Civil Rights Act, and I discuss this with my students.  Dr. King continued to lead protests and marches which lead to voting rights.  Even though the African American people had the right to vote, they were not allowed to vote in several parts of the US...particularity the south.  

Eventually, we come to the unfortunate part of Dr. King's life with his assassination.  We discuss how he wanted peace and didn't want anyone not even his enemies to be killed with his peaceful movement.  Unfortunately, he lost his life, and so did Gandhi.  We discuss the impact his life had on the world, however.  It's been 51 years since his death, yet we still talk about him and honor his life because of the mark he made in our world.  His legacy continues to live on through us by living out his dream.
My students read the following text from this Teacher Pay Teachers resource: MLK Bios.

The Dream

I hate to admit this, but I never actually read the I Have a Dream speech until I started teaching 6th grade 4 years ago.  I had heard the speech about every year on MLK Day, but I had never actually read it.  I realized this when I was thinking about having my students read through this speech.  I had always been taught about the speech, but I had never actually read the real deal.  I decided that not only was I going to read it, but I was going to share it with my students.  We were going to use a primary resource to learn just what the speech was and how it changed our country.  

I do something called a "close" read when teaching from the speech.  With a close read, the students are given a text to read on their own and annotate.  Then we read it together and analyze the text closely.  For this speech, I attach this Google Doc on Google Classroom: I Have a Dream Close Read.  This copy has the answers my students and I discussed in red, but feel free to make a copy and delete the answers.  Before they read it, they share whatever background knowledge they have and then they have to think of three questions for the speech.  For the next step, they read as much of the text they can for the rest of the class.  They are encouraged to annotate the text as well.  Most students just end up circling several words they don't know because there are several words within the text that are unfamiliar to them.  However, I loved how some of my students this year looked up the words they didn't know each time they came to a word that was unfamiliar.  Some of my students with a stronger reading ability color coded the text in different colored high lighters.  One student had a specific color for all the figurative language she found and said that she didn't realize how poetic this speech is.  She's absolutely right.  Dr. King's words are beautifully written and spoken with this speech.  He was definitely a man who knew how to paint a picture with words.  Here's Teachers Pay Teachers link to a copy of the speech.  This particular copy is free and there's some other activities to go along with it: I Have a Dream Speech. 

For day 2 of this lesson, I use the Google Doc I have attached to their Google Classroom and we do part B together.  I stop at specific parts of the speech and we discuss the meaning and significance.  I start off by asking who the "great American" is ans they almost immediately make the connection that he is talking about Abraham Lincoln.  Some of my students this year commented: "It's like he is wanting to complete Lincoln's unfinished business."  

On day 3, I try to plan for MLK Day. Our district does not get this day off.  I'm not sure why, but it is a planned school day for us.  This year, we had a snow day and E Learning Day on MLK day.  I still wanted to honor Dr. King that day, so for my students' E Learning assignment, they had to find some MLK quotes online and share their favorite as well as discuss the meaning of the quote.  They shared their favorite quote and thoughts on Google Classroom.  If there wasn't a snow day, I plan to show the I Have a Dream speech on MLK Day, but this year it had to be the day after.  Usually I have been able to find the speech on You Tube, but I had a lot of trouble with that this year.  I couldn't find a speech that played the entire version with sound.  I researched why this could be the case and as it turns out, the speech is copyrighted and is private property of the King family.  I had no idea: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2017/01/15/54-years-later-you-still-have-to-pay-to-use-martin-luther-king-jr-s-famous-i-have-a-dream-speech/?utm_term=.e3fc564405ed.

I want to share this speech with my students legally, so I ended up purchasing my own copy on Amazon: I Have a Dream DVD.  

At first I was a kind of annoyed by the copyright issue, but after a bit of reflection, I get it.  How easy would it be for someone to change the words of this speech?  Now a days, it's not that difficult, so I understand why the King family is protective of this speech.  I'm sure they want Dr. King's words to remain the way they were in 1963.  

I tell the students to read along with the speech as they listen to Dr. King deliver the speech.  Keep in mind these are squirley 6th graders who have to be reminded constantly to keep their hands to themselves and to keep the noise level down and to stop talking during direct instruction and all that.  During this speech, they are quiet and I haven't had to get onto a student yet for not paying attention. Dr. King's delivery during the speech almost instantly draws them in.  After the speech is over, they all want to share their thoughts, but I tell them to type them out on the Google Doc, and then we discuss what they are thinking and feeling.  I've had several powerful reactions to the speech in years past.  On the first year I shared the speech, there was one student who I wasn't sure what his reaction would be.  He was the kind of kid who would randomly draw the a picture of the confederate flag in his free time.  After the speech was over, he turned to me and said, "Mrs. Snapp, that gave me chills."  One of my favorite comments this year was, "It just makes me want to be a better person."  I couldn't agree more. 

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Connections

One of my students made a cool connection with Harry Potter regarding the I Have a Dream speech.  I get excited anytime my students connect Harry Potter with something in the real world because I'm just that much of a nerd.  Anyway, this student said that it was almost like Dr. King looked into the Mirror of Erised and wrote down what he saw.  I thought that was a cool connection.  This dream was Dr. King's heart's desire.  He wanted this dream to become a reality for his children and for future generations. Unfortunately, he made the ultimate sacrifice for this dream, but the dream's legacy lives on.
Another connection my students made is the beginning of the dream "Five Score years ago..."  A student in my co taught class said, "I've heard something like that before I think in a speech that Abraham Lincoln made."  He's referring to the Gettysburg Address, and he's absolutely right.  The Gettysburg address begins, "Four score and seven years ago..."  I was proud of this student for making a connection like this and because of that we were able to discuss that maybe Dr. King used these words as a reflection of Abraham Lincoln's words.

The Importance of Dr. King's Message

It's no secret that the racial division in our country has become more divided than what it has been in the past few years.  Because of this, I want to instill with my students Dr. King's message of peace and love.  I want them to grow up to be people who treat everyone with kindness including those who are different from them.  My hope is that my students will take Dr. King's message with them and truly make the world a better place.