The Golden Rule

A good portion of the Social Studies curriculum for 1st grade focuses on the Golden Rule. This very Islam-friendly concept is also taught to us through various ahadith from our Imams. One such one is:

"Treat others similar to the way you would like for them to treat you."
-Imam Hassan, the second Imam [a]
Bihar-ul-Anwar, vol. 78, p. 116

(Found online at www.al-islam.org/flowers)

This became the monthly theme for March for my class. We made a poster with the hadith, and each student came up with one way they could follow this advice. I also had little grids taped on each of the students desk, and when I see them following this, I put a star sticker on their chart. I plan on rewarding the students who fill up their chart. Also, we have an akhlaq chart that we started early in the year. On one side there are examples of bad akhlaq and the other side good. These are all behaviors that we see in class, and put them on the chart as they occur (of course the name of the person is omitted).

Our 12 Imams Flapbook

I have been trying to encourage the students to learn and eventually memorize the names of our 12 Imams. Some of them are more familiar with these names than others. I had them make a flapbook at the beginning of the year. As we discuss an Imam, I have the students fill in their books, with a few (up to 5) fast facts about the lifetime of the Imam (AS). On the top portion, they draw a picture, usually having to do with a story I tell them about this Imam.

We sometimes pray salat in our classroom, and at the end of the salat we do a short ziyarat. I have each of the students say the name of one of the 14 infallibles, and then the rest of the students repeat, in hopes that this will help them remember all the names in order. We also made cards that are strung across the classroom, to help them remember while they are saying the ziyarat.

 

Wudhu Book

This is another project from my neighbor. As the students are learning to do wudhu, it can be hard for them to remember all the steps, including which ones are wajib, mustahab, etc. The teacher next door had her students each make a wudhu book, with a step on each page, and a drawing of a child performing that step.

Sadaqa Jars

Our class recently made sadaqa (charity) jars, in hopes to instill a positive habit of donating to charity regularly. We talked about the rewards and benefits of sadaqa, and some of the different forms it can take (smiles, clothes, time, money, etc). I couldn't find too much information from Shia sources online, but I did use some hadith from A Bundle of Flowers and also some that I was made aware of by a local scholar:

http://www.al-islam.org/flowers/

"Sadaqa will repel calamities" -Holy Prophet (PBUH)
"Sadaqa will prolong your life" -Imam Ali (AS)
"Sadaqa will save you from diseases, such as being stingy, arrogant, and other bad habits" -Imam Jafar Sadiq (AS)
"Sadaqa will bring peace among the people" -Holy Prophet (PBUH)

To make the sadaqa jars, we used empty plastic honey bottles, which I had previously cut a hole on the top of. I taped the jar shut, so that the only opening was where the money would go through. The students took tissue paper and used a paintbrush with the glue and water mixture to stick the paper to the jar. The next day, when it dried, they wrote "sadaqa" on it with a marker, and then painted over the paper with clear, glittery paint. I had prepared a little tag with a hadith on it before hand, which we tied to the jar. Of course, there are many ways to make the same type of thing, using different materials.

Muharram/Safar Activities

The tragedy of Karbala is a huge part of our faith. Sometimes it can be challenging to teach this to younger kids in a way that will resonate with them, and come up with activities and projects.

Here are some resources that I have used:

http://www.saba-igc.org/Education/Madrasa/syllabus/books/Grade%201%20History%20Book.pdf - This is for 1st grade, which is what I teach, but on the website there are books for many grade levels.

"Tears for Karbala" - http://www.al-islam.org/gallery/kids/Books/tears/index.html

For the first days of Muharram, I went through stories with my children, like a mini-majlis, each day emphasizing on one or two of the heroes of Karbala. The resource above was great because it told the story in a couple pages of some of these people.

Muslim ibn Aqeel:

Mokhtarname (The Mukhtar Narrative), which is currently available on YouTube and http://www.shiasource.com/, has a very nice visual of Hazrat Muslim ibn Aqeel's story. You can show the part where Muslim is walking toward the court of ibn Ziyad and is slowly deserted by the people of Kufa (episode 7, about 48:05), up until the part where he fights the enemies (episode 8, about 12:40). I skip some parts in between, and also do not show his actual death.

Bibi Zainab's speech in the court of Yazid:

This clip does the job in giving a visual of Bibi Zainab and Imam Sajjad (AS)'s speech in Damascus. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvdpPggY04M&feature=player_embedded (starts at about 1:27). With the movie clips, the subtitles went too quickly for younger kids, so I dubbed. For older kids, this would be okay.

Other resources/activities:
*Crossword: Easy to make on http://www.theteacherscorner.net/. (If anyone knows how to attach word docs, please let me know!)
*Maps: These make it a lot easier for the kids to understand the events, since they spanned several cities and countries. A quick google search will lead to many helpful images. If you project it onto the board, you can draw a line showing the journey of the family of the Prophet (P). Here is one map I used:

*Art activity: acrostic poem. I had my students write acrositc poems with the word KARBALA. First, we brainstormed words with each of the letters. As a class, they were able to do this. For older kids, you may want them to do it on their own. Then, We wrote the word Karbala on a black paper vertically. We used chalk. They then wrote the words starting with each letter horizontally. Then, we glued the black construction paper onto a thicker white paper (almost like posterboard). I had them use a piece of plastic (like a tile) which they dipped in red paint, to smear on the white paper. The end result looked like this:

*Art/Language Arts: Flags. This is a project my 3rd/4th grade neighbor did with her students. Each flag has a word/phrase such as strength, importance of salat, helpful, sacrifice, truth, Islam, love for Allah, faithful, justice. Then comes a "dictionary definition" of each. After that is an example of this trait as it was shown in Karbala. The flags are then strung against a bulletin board.

I would love to hear your ideas/comments/suggestions/etc!

Welcome!

Salam alaykum and welcome! As a new teacher, it is very hard for me to find resources for activities relating to Islamic Studies curriculum. My hope for this blog is that it will be a place for teachers, educators, parents, and anyone else to collaborate and share ideas. If you know websites, books, resources, blogs or anything that would help other teachers such as myself, please feel free to post them in comments. Also, if you have any projects or ideas you would like to share, please do not hesitate to do so!