Freedom isn't Free

We weren't one the lucky schools to have Veterans Day off. It wound up working out nicely though, because the kids LOVED learning about Veterans Day and why we celebrate it. We made an anchor chart about our schema on the word "Veteran" and we added "New Learning" as we built on our background knowledge. After some class discussion, some really neat video clips about veterans on youtube and two fantastic read aloud's the kids were ready to send some Thank you notes to our American Soldiers.

A few students had a special person in their family they wanted to send their letter to. Some wrote their letter to a coworkers husband who is currently serving in the Army. Some letters we will send overseas to our troops. We put the letters on patriotic stationary and brainstormed some words and phrases that we may need. We were touched by the letters our first graders wrote. They really poured their little hearts into their writing and illustrations.