Movie: The Secret Life of Zoey Theme: Helping Your Friends
Teaser Question: Would you risk your friendship to keep your friends from doing drugs?
Going Deeper: Is keeping a secret the only way, or even the best way, to be a loyal friend?
Making Choices: Are there situations where you would keep a secret for a friend and others where telling the secret would be the best thing a friend could do? Describe these situations.
Movie: Shrek Theme: Friendship
Teaser Question: What happens when you get into fights with your friends?
Going Deeper: Are friends always honest about the way they feel? Are there times when making a friend face the truth might be too much to ask?
Making Choices: You know that there is a lot of tension and trouble at your friend's home. You also know that your friend has not been getting very good grades. You ask how things are going and your friend simply replies, "Things are fine." Do you leave your friend alone, or do you press your friend to open up? Do you go to others and tell them about your concerns for your friend? How can you best support your friend? Who could you go to for help and advice?
Movie: School of Rock Theme: Leaving Someone Behind
Teaser Question: Do you think what happened here was okay? Why? Why not?
Going Deeper: When is it wrong to leave someone out of a group? When is it right? If someone wants in, should you automatically include them?
Making Choices: The coach asks you and a few other players who made the team last year to give input on who should make the team this year. Your best friend wants to be on the team but is not as good as some of the others who are trying out. Should you lie, abstain or be honest with the coach about your friend's abilities? What will you say to your friend? A: Try to take their minds off their fear by telling them that they really do know the material? B: Encourage your friends to talk about their fears? C: Leave the group and study by yourself?
Movie: The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King Theme: Commitment
Teaser Question: How do you earn the support of others?
Going Deeper: How do promises and pledges express loyalty (for example, marriage vows or the Pledge of Allegiance)? What do you do if you or a friend breaks a promise or pledge? What does it mean to be loyal? When is loyalty a good thing? When might it be a bad thing?
Making Choices: You have signed up to participate in a neighborhood cleanup day this weekend. Later, a friend calls and asks you to go to a family picnic where there is no one your friend's age, and your friend doesn't want to be bored and lonely. The picnic is the same day as the cleanup. Does loyalty help you decide which event you should go to? Which is more important: helping your friend or keeping your promise?
Activities
Keeping a Journal
As a homework assignment or in a class activity, the students will write two entries into their journal under the heading of Loyalty answering the following questions:
Of all the examples of loyalty demonstrated in the clips, which were your favorites? Why?
Tell of a time when you showed loyalty in your life?
Tell of a time when you were not loyal. What were the consequences?
Activity 1: Telling Secrets
Performance Objective: To consider how different situations influence our understanding of what it means to be loyal.
Materials Needed: None
Instructions:
Divide the class into small groups of three or four, and ask them to discuss the following situations. In which situations would you keep a friend's secret? In which situations would you feel the need to tell the secret in order to help your friend?
Situation 1: A friend shoplifts/steals from a store.
Situation 2: A friend cheats on a test.
Situation 3: A friend has found some money in school that does not belong to her/him and wants to keep it.
Situation 4: A friend has thought about committing suicide and tells you.
Situation 5: A friend is pregnant and is thinking about having an abortion.
After the groups have taken several minutes to discuss their thoughts with one another, ask them to report their thoughts to the rest of the class. Where there are differences of thought about whether to tell or keep a friend's secret, encourage students to talk about why they made their choices.
Activity 2: What is a Friend?
Performance Objective: To define what a friend is or does, and to consider the ways in which we do or do not fulfill that definition.
Materials Needed: Paper and pen/pencils
Instructions:
Ask each student to take a sheet of paper and draw two lines from top to bottom, creating three separate columns.
In column 1, students should write down as many words as they can think of, one below the other, which complete the sentence, "A friend is/does..."
Students look at each word listed in column 1 and answer the question, "Does this word describe me?" In response, they should write either "Yes," "No," or "Sometimes," in column 2.
In column 3, students should look at each word in column 1 and think of one person they know who does display this characteristic of friendship.
Ask students to pair up with one another and share what they wrote down. Are their answers similar or different?
After a period of time, ask students to come together and read out their words in column 1, while you write them down on the board. Are there many words that were found on several students' sheets? Ask them how hard or easy it is to be a friend.
Activity 3: Loyalty Mural
Performance Objective: To encourage students to think about all the various aspects of loyalty.
Materials Needed: A large sheet of poster board or newsprint, colored markers
Instructions:
Write on the top of the sheet of poster board or newsprint the words, "Loyalty is..."
Invite each student to take some colored chalk and express their idea of what loyalty is. They can write anywhere on the sheet, graffiti-style.
Students can return to the sheet and write down another answer, but everyone must contribute at least once.
Lead a class discussion on the things that were written down and then post the mural somewhere in the halls where other classes can see it.
Activity 4: Role Play
Performance Objective: To express opinions on a topic through written, oral, or dramatic expression.
Materials Needed: Paper, pencil, props for skits
Instructions:
The teacher divides the class into groups of five students.
Groups are instructed to come up with a situation where someone displays loyalty to another person or to a group, and then develop a short role play or "skit" to explore this example of loyalty.
Each group presents their skit to the whole class.
After all the role plays have been performed, the teacher leads the whole class in a discussion on the ideas contained in the skits regarding loyalty.
Optional Teaching Strategies
Students should conduct research, then write an essay on a famous individual who had to persevere in order to accomplish something great. Examples include President Abraham Lincoln, inventor Thomas Edison, astronaut John Glenn, etc.
Students write an essay describing situations where it is good to know when to quit, when not to persist in doing something.
Students draw nine dots on a page, as seen below. Ask the students to find a way to connect all nine dots using four straight lines without lifting their pens from the paper. The exercise is very difficult, but possible. After some time has passed, ask the students to try thinking in nontraditional ways to achieve their goal. In the end, the only way to accomplish the deed is to work outside the box. Starting at the top right dot, draw a straight line diagonally down to the bottom left dot. Then, the second line moves right across the box and through and past the bottom right dot. The third line starts where the second line ended outside the box and goes diagonally across the box through and past the middle right dot and the middle top dot. The fourth line begins where the third line ended outside the box and goes straight down, attaching the left hand column of dots. Thus, an arrow-like set of lines has been created. Why is it necessary at times not just to persist, but also to think "outside the box" in order to succeed?