A brochure of safety tips

The students summarize information they have read and learned in school to create a brochure of important safety tips. They work in teams, each on a specific area of safety, to create a multimedia presentation on the computer using HyperStudio for text, graphics, and sound or other publishing or presentation software.

A lesson plan for grade 3 English Language Arts and Healthful Living

By Shanti Kudva

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Related topics

• Learn more about health, injury prevention, instructions, language arts, safety, water safety, and writing.

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Learning outcomes

Students will:

• work in teams to recall and list the rules they have learned for safety in a variety of situations
• write rhymes that express their safety theme
• illustrate their safety theme
• read/recite and explain their safety theme
• use the computer to prepare a multimedia presentation using HyperStudio for word processing, graphics (paint tools), and sound

Teacher planning

Time required for lesson

8 hours

Materials/resources

• books on safety
• planning sheets for each team to create their cards for the HyperStudio stack

Technology resources

• computer
• HyperStudio software—if you do not have the software, you may download the HyperStudio plug-in to play the sample stack. This plug-in is available from the Hyperstudio website.
• Other publishing or presentation software can be used, or students can publish paper brochures.

Pre-activities

• Read about, brainstorm, and discuss safety themes such as fire safety, water safety or playground safety.
• Teach/review main idea and list strategies for writing.
• Teach/review rhymes and the structure of poems with rhyming words.
• Provide opportunities to use paint tools and write text using the computer.
• Emphasize reading aloud with expression
• Practice with cooperative learning in small groups of three or four.

Activities

1. The students work in teams to write a list of rules to follow for their specific safety theme such as fire safety, water safety, playground safety, bus safety or school safety.
2. The students work in teams to illustrate their safety theme.
3. The students work in teams to write a poem/rap which reflects their safety theme.
4. The students work in teams to use word processing and graphics to create their card for the class safety stack.
5. The students practice reading to explain their theme and incorporate this sound on their card.
6. The students create a button on their card to move it to the main menu card.
7. The students work as a class to create a main menu card, title card, and a last card with rolling credits.
8. The students make up some safety verses to sing to a familiar tune and incorporate these on some of the cards.

Assessment

Have students evaluate the content of each card to determine:

1. Focus: Is it is relevant to the specific chosen safety theme?
2. Organization: Are the safety rules organized in a logical manner?
3. Support and Elaboration: Are details accurate and clearly understood?
4. Style: Are the sentences in the style of safety brochures (second person, imperative sentences, short and to the point, etc.)?
5. Conventions: Is the punctuation and grammar appropriate for a safety brochure (use of exclamation points, bold print, different fonts and font sizes).

The teacher assesses the planning sheets from each team for organization, details, and clarity of the written material and the relevance of the graphics.

Supplemental information

A safety verse/song to a familiar tune could be something like this:

The song is sung to the tune of “Do You Know the Muffin Man?”

Comments

Students in teams become the “experts” on their specific safety theme and become capable of teaching the other students. All students tend to remember vital safety information better in this way.