Create an Obama Poster

Teachervision has a great compilation of resources and lessons for MLK day for different grade levels: https://www.teachervision.com/holidays/martin-luther-king-jr

The YouTube video from PBSNews is a nice overview of MLK day and student engagement (2011)

This is a great, short lesson about Ruby Bridges from Stanford University.

MLK Wordsearch – PDF

Have younger students draw a picture of the service they provided to someone in their family.

Older students can write a short descriptive essay explaining what they did and how it helped another person.

Resources:

• AmeriCorps MLK Day of Service.
• President Obama from 2015 talking about MLK Day of Service

Have students read the articles from National Geographic Kids on MLK and Barack Obama:

• MLK Biography
• Obama Biography

Have students create a Venn Diagram about what they learned about MLK and Obama.

• PDF of MLK/Obama Venn Diagram

1. Have students learn more about the iconic HOPE poster designed by artist Shepard Fairey.
2. Have you students talk about what HOPE and DREAM mean to them.
3. Make a list of other words that inspire change for the better good.
4. Have each student choose their favorite word from the list.
5. Have you students take a ‘presidential’ picture (encourage them to dress up!)
6. Use https://obamapostermaker.com/ for each student to create their own poster and screen shot it to share with the group.

If you have access to a laser cutter, you could use the laser cutter to engrave the posters into a piece of wood for students to make into magnets, or to display. 

You could also print out the posters to create buttons!

After the students design their symbol it is up to the teacher to expand on the activity the following are some ideas that would work. Please let the MFL team know if you think of anything that should be added to this list!

ART: have students print out their photo in black and white and color it with red and blue to match Shepard Fairey’s style.

HISTORY: Focus on MLKs mission and how it lives on today.

MATH: Have students look up the crowd numbers for MLK speeches and Barack Obama’s speeches (or other polital/historical figures) Have them create a ratio of attendance.

ELA:  There are countless books about MLK out there and writing exercises for students of all grades to engage with!