Page 12 - Teacher Guide Book

BookConnect: Building Community One Book at a Time
Area of Focus: Personal & Community Well-Being

Topic: Celebrating Diversity and Inclusion
Level 2: Learn, Ages 5-8

TEACHER GUIDE: THE SKIN YOU LIVE IN

Book 4 of 10

Share the Book Initiate Discussion

Ask students to consider what humans would look like if
they had no skin. Do they feel lucky to have the skin they
live in that so beautifully holds the “YOU who’s within"?

Invite students to consider the various purposes and
functions of skin in the human body.

Review the food/skin comparisons from the book. If
students were to pick a food to describe their own skin
color, what food would they pick? If they had an option to
keep changing the color of their skin to mimic various
foods, would the purpose of their skin change? What
would they think if the skin covering of all their favorite
THE SKIN foods was the same color?

YOU LIVE IN Allow students to consider whether skin color has

anything to do with a person’s imagination, creativity,
by Michael Tyler talents, hopes, and dreams.

Coordinate Group Activities

An Apple is an Apple is an Apple... Role Playing – Be a Plum

Many fruits and vegetables come in different colors, Divide the class into two groups, the black plums and the
shapes and sizes (peppers, potatoes, tomatoes, plums, red plums, who all live happily in one neighborhood. In
apples, grapes, etc.). Bring several types of fruits and/or comes a green plum (you – the teacher – can play this
vegetables to class, making sure you have at least three part), who feels nervous, anxious, and somewhat out of
varieties of each type. Ask your students to consider the place amidst neighbors that seem so different. Invite
best way to sort or classify them. Color, shape, size or both groups to make suggestions on how they might
function? Guide students to understand that despite make you feel more at home. You may share specifics
differences in color/shape/size, an apple is an apple and on how you – the green plum – feel. Encourage the red
a potato is a potato. None of the differences disqualifies and black plums to support the green plum by providing
them from belonging with their group. This is because reasons to give friendship a chance. You may note all
the skin we live in and what it covers does not change suggestions on a vision board that guides students in
what or who we are – whether we’re talking about an adopting an inclusive mindset.
apple, potato or person.
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