Our team is thinking of using the Heroes book from Dennis Denenberg to create a persuasive essay on Benjamin Franklin. Using the two page article, along with a primary source document that we will find, we will have the kids analyze whether they feel Ben Franklin was a hero for his time period. After analysis, they will be able to persuade the audience to agree with them on whether or not we should view him as a hero. The persuasive essay will be a standard five paragraph essay graded with the standard 5th grade district rubric.
I think this activity is going to be very easy to implement into the classroom this year. Obviously I will have to make sure we have a discussion about what a hero really is before we start. I don't think it is necessary to wait until I teach Colonial or American Revolution time periods before beginning the lesson. It can be a stand alone lesson, in my opinion, simply related to our persuasive writing lesson. I also think it can be a nice lead into beginning my unit in Colonial history because now we can look at each person we study as to whether they are a hero or not in our eyes. This will, hopefully, help students connect better with the content in our American History standards.
