Thinking About Our Troops

Teaching Theme of the Week

from Education World®

A handful of ways for kids to connect with America's soldiers serving around the globe.

Subjects: Language Arts, Educational Technology, Social Studies

Grade Levels: K-2, 3-5, 6-8, 9-12

Objectives
Students will:

• write thoughtful messages of hope and support to U.S. military personnel, and
• explore other ways to support America's troops.

Keywords
Iraq, soldiers, community service, war, troops, letters, email, Memorial Day, Veterans Day

Materials Needed

• Internet access (optional for students; required for teachers)
• pencils, paper

Procedure
This lesson offers ideas for students who would like to send messages to soldiers who are fighting for our country or serving in other ways.

Operation Dear Abby enables Americans to send special messages to our servicemen and women. The program, which dates back to the years of the Vietnam War, used to provide mailing addresses; but, with the difficulty delivering mail to service personnel in Iraq, Operation Dear Abby has gone online. Anybody can send or read messages of support sent to sailors, marines, soldiers, airmen and women, or Coast Guard members.

For classroom purposes, you might have students compose messages of support on paper. The messages can be corrected; after correction, students might type their corrected messages into a computer email program.

After the messages are sent, they can be accessed by any service member anywhere, so, if you would like to add one more step to the process, students could type their messages into a word processing document. Then you could cut and paste each message into a new Operation Dear Abby window.

Note from the site: "Service members without Internet access may still read messages. Company commanders who have Internet access have the ability to download bulk messages to be printed and distributed according to service branch and location."

More Ideas for Connecting Kids and Soldiers
For additional ways in which students might show their support for America's troops stationed overseas, see Lessons in Life: Connecting Kids and Soldiers.

Assessment
Students demonstrate their care and concern by writing thoughtful messages to America's servicemen and women.

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