Ms. Stack’s English 11/ENL students recently practiced extending kindness toward themselves while uplifting others through a moving poetry exercise. By focusing on empathy, students found a meaningful way to explore their own vulnerability.
After watching the film, “The Pursuit of Happyness,” students engaged in a reflective three-part poetry assignment: writing a poem to the movie’s main character; writing a poem to someone important to them; and writing a poem to themselves.
Students then selected the poem that was most meaningful to them, made revisions, and prepared for a gallery walk. The gallery walk gave students the opportunity to read and comment on their peers’ work, sharing notes of encouragement and support.
Ms. Stack commented, “These students are some of the most resilient people that I know, and they have dealt with numerous setbacks in order to get to where they are now. I feel incredibly fortunate that I get to teach them every single day, using both inspiration from my colleagues and the beauty of poetry as a foundation for having necessary conversations about empathy and kindness. My goal was to encourage students to tap into their more vulnerable sides, providing them the space where they could explore feelings of empathy.”
