Living the Promise
By Maria Brountas

A first grader reenacts Barbara Frietchie's fierce devotion to our flag.

Online Extra: Living the Promise Classroom Activites click here.

I'm sure many of us would agree that teaching children to say the Pledge of Allegiance by rote isn't really learning it at all. However, 10 meaningful minutes a day is all that's needed to ignite a lifelong passion in any child. This is easily accomplished when the Pledge of Allegiance is presented within the context of the history that created it.

In my classroom, I display the Pledge of Allegiance in blue letters on word cards. Red-lettered word cards, used to define abstract words, are placed in front of them.

The definitions help, but students truly begin to understand these abstract concepts in the next phase of our study.

A place in history. I model role-playing for the children, and then we do reenactments of events in the lives of historical figures such as Christopher Columbus, Squanto, Barbara Frietchie, Widow Pickersgill and her daughter Caroline, Francis Scott Key, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln.

Concepts that may be difficult to grasp are made accessible when students act out the story of how young Abraham Lincoln took responsibility for ruining his mother's newly-whitewashed ceiling, or how Barbara Frietchie remained loyal to the flag even as Confederate soldiers attacked her home.

During the reenactments we list the character traits of the people we're studying. As we do this, the students discover that they share some of those traits. We discuss how each trait is a stepping stone to becoming a responsible person and, therefore, a good American. To encourage certain types of behavior, I make a Good Citizen Chart listing the most grade-appropriate character traits (following directions, keeping promises, etc.) and the students get a star next to their name when they exhibit one of the traits.

Maria's red, white and blue explication of the Pledge, with definitions of the tougher words in red.

Learning to live the promise. The historical reenactments are the first in a series of seven daily steps that can help your students to understand the Pledge and appreciate our country. It takes no more than 10 minutes to complete all seven steps.

1. Rise and remember. Choose a historical vignette to reenact. In the beginning, you can select the event to reenact. As the children become comfortable with the process, they can select the event.
2. Pledge. Stand at attention, place hand on heart with the fingers together and the thumb pointing slightly upward, and recite the Pledge. The placement of the thumb – toward the children's heads – serves as a reminder that they are making the promise.
3. Recall. Discuss that day's historical vignette in detail.
4. Personal promise selection. Choose a class citizenship goal from the Good Citizen Chart (speaking in a kind tone of voice, keeping the environment clean, etc.). I start my students with one goal for the entire class. Later on, children may select individual goals.
5. Recognition. Recognize peers who showed evidence of reaching past citizenship goals.
6. Record. Place stars by the appropriate citizenship attribute on the Good Citizen Chart.
7. Current event. Children respond to a teacher-selected citizenship word by telling how a classroom or news event applies to the word.

Young historians. An ongoing project in my class is our Good American Citizen Book, in which each child writes and illustrates a true story about a time when he or she exhibited the behavior of a good American citizen.

In learning about the lives of the remarkable people who are part of our American heritage, the children gradually begin to see our flag with new eyes. In time, they appreciate the diversity that contributed to our country's greatness. They begin to realize that it's their responsibility as young American citizens to be loyal to the flag and to embody all it represents.

Two boys act out the inspiration for "The Star-Spangled Banner." The boy holding the flag represents Fort McHenry, and the boy in the yellow shirt is playing the role of Francis Scott Key. "Francis" played his part to the hilt, cheering, "It's there! Our flag is still there!"

Online Extra: Living the Promise Classroom Activites click here.

Maria Brountas teaches first grade at Vine Street School in Bangor, ME.

August/September 2003, Vol.34, No.1