Lessons plans for Growing Season: The Life of a Migrant Community
for grades 3-12.
 Kent State University Class Project
As a result of the impact of Growing Season in the schools, Kent State University’s College of Education, Health and Human Services teacher education program have adopted Growing Season: The Life of a Migrant Community as a class project.
Teacher candidates in Dr. Anne Morrison’s Educational Psychology classes are putting the University’s strategic principles of innovation, beyond the Kent Campus and fostering relationships into action as they fulfill their course requirements by writing lesson plans for Growing Season or two other community projects. The 50-minute lesson plans are tied to the Ohio Department of Education (ODE) standards, indicators and benchmarks.
Terry Anderson, outreach director for the Greater Columbus Arts Council, describes the importance of universities connecting to community during a presentation Connecting to the Community Through Arts and Cultural Outreach: “Arts and cultural collaborations between universities and national, state and local organizations offer concrete examples of how academic theory transforms into practice while providing a mutual benefit to the university and the society at large.”
These lesson plans, created by students for students, provide real-world learning opportunities and exemplify putting ideas into practice for the mutual benefit of the university and community.
Growing Season is one of three community-based, engaged-learning projects the teacher candidates can choose from in my 4 sections of Educational Psychology 29525. These teacher candidates may choose from the following three projects: Growing Season in Hartville, Lake View Cemetery in Cleveland, or Cleveland Museum of Natural History. The candidates collaborate with each other and educators in the field to create 50 minute integrated lesson plans that combine more than one core subject area using the Ohio Department of Education (ODE) Lesson Plan Template. The lessons must support at least two ODE standards, benchmarks, and indicators.|
In the case of Growing Season, the teacher candidates hosted migrant families and participants from the Growing season project for a dinner and get together in the College of Education, Health, and Human Services last fall. The event gave everyone a chance to meet and share stories. Later in the semester, a dozen or so of the candidates attended the Hartville Migrant Center Open House where the teacher candidates again met migrant workers and others featured in the book. The candidates were given permission to visit the fields and the camps where the migrant workers live. Each of them reported amazement at what they saw and learned. The candidates formed into groups to begin work on the Unit Plans. Authors Gary Harwood and David Hassler made themselves available for consultation.
The assignment will be expanded to include classroom experiences from several teachers in the Canton and Massillon schools including 3rd and 4th grade Gifted Education classes and an alternative school named, Choices. This special program supports students who have returned to school after dropping out.
Finally, pairs of candidates created the following 50-minute lesson included below. These lessons are intended to be resources for teachers in the field who are including Growing Season: The Life of a Migrant Community in their curriculum.
Dr Anne Morrison
Associate Professor
Kent State University
Amber Thomasson and Kristin Maile 2nd grade Growing Season Lesson Plan—Fall 2006
This lesson plan has been created to collaborate with the book Growing season: The life of a migrant community. The larger unit plan may be accompanied with a field trip to Zeller’s Farm in Hartville, OH. The lesson requires students to communicate about planting crop vegetables without using spoken language. The use of silence emphasizes the taken for granted ease of speaking a dominant language in the learning environment. This lesson addresses several 2nd grade Academic Content Standards including History, Economics, Life Sciences, Social Studies and Scientific Inquiry.
PDF – Lesson Plan 01
 Samantha Christoff and Laura Delfre 2nd grade Growing Season Lesson Plan—Fall 2006
In the lesson the class will read a passage from Growing season: The life of a migrant community. As a class, the students will discuss what the story tells about the culture of the migrant workers. The students will also recognize the similarities and differences between their own culture and the culture of a migrant worker. After reviewing the elements of punctuation, the students will learn how to properly compose a friendly letter. Their letters will be sent to a classroom of migrant children.
PDF – Lesson Plan 02
 Sarah Kost 4th grade Growing Season Lesson Plan—Fall 2006
This lesson is designed to be co-taught by a deaf education specialist and a general education instructor. The entire lesson will be taught simultaneously through verbal communication and American Sign Language (ASL), in order to accommodate the Deaf students in the classroom and teach the hearing students ASL. The lesson addresses writing, vocabulary, and social studies standards using a story from the book Growing season: Life of a migrant community. Six new vocabulary words from this story are introduced. Teachers will ask students to write their own brief reaction story, which should sequence events of the story, include descriptive details, characters, and the setting.
PDF – Lesson Plan 03
Amanda Sturm 2nd grade Math and Science Growing Season Lesson Plan, Fall--2006
Using the stories in the book Growing season: The life of a migrant community as a foundation Math and Science will be integrated into this lesson by having the students grow their own plants in an effort to better understand the daily life of a migrant worker. This lesson will incorporate Math through the measurement of the materials that will be used to grow these specific plants. The class will then focus on Science by examining the life cycle of a plant and understanding how the plant grows successfully. The lesson will connect to the Measurement and Life Sciences Academic Content Standards.
PDF – Lesson Plan 04
Kristal Funk, Rachael Boylen and Dominique Rodgers 4th grade collaborative Social Studies, Science and Physical Education Growing Season Lesson Plan, Fall--2006
This lesson is preceded by the reading of Growing season: The life of a migrant community and a visit to the Zeller’s farm to explore the life of the migrant workers. While there we participated in harvesting the crops. We also talked with some of the workers and learned more about their culture and lifestyles. This lesson helps students further examine the cultural practices and products of the migrant workers, and how harvesting pertains to their lifestyle. Students will develop a better understanding of cultural differences, how crops grow, and also the importance of daily exercise in a healthy life. The lesson addresses Life Sciences, People in Societies, and Physical Education Academic Content Standards.
PDF – Lesson Plan 05
Lesson Plan 6: Ms. Fasso and Ms. Rushe
For our lesson plan, we are integrating Social Studies and Visual Arts into one project. This project is educationally important for students at the first grade level because it will give them an opportunity to think about the aspects of a different culture and community other than their own. The students will
be expected to combine their thoughts about the presented
culture with different aspects of visual art. Ms. Fasso and Ms. Rushe
PDF – Lesson plan 6
Lesson Plan 7: Becky Delgado and Samantha Vyner
Miss Delgado and Miss Vyner created this third grade level lesson plan
that is great for learning letter writing and healthy habits. This
lesson was inspired by the Growing Season: The Life of a Migrant
Community book and will help students understand different communities
around them.
PDF – Lesson Plan 7
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