This is the question I ask my students before reading this book. I told them that the character in the story Ikarus Jackson was afraid to be his true self and I wanted them to see how the author challenges us to embrace our differences and celebrate our individuality..
Only then can we truly fly!
After reading, we discussed how it is important to always be true to your friends, stand up for what you believe in and NEVER bully someone. I discussed with students on how bullying scars people for life. Togo along with this I had them get a clean sheet of paper out...this is what we discovered.
The sheet of paper was clean, no indentions, tears, scratches, etc.
Next, I told students to crumble the paper up and stomp on it.
When everyone was finished, I instructed the students to now try their very best to get the paper like it was before we crumbled it up.
The students tried VERY hard to get their paper exactly how it was before, disvoering that is was impossible. When the students finally gave up,their paper still had crinkles, tears, and dirty spots. I told them this is exactly how people are when we make fun, belittle, and/or tease them, their scars never truly go away. One thing I wanted my students to take from this lesson is to treat everyone like you would want to be treated and to realize that everyone has feelings and everyone needs to be able to embrace their differences without being criticized for it (like Ikarus Jackson in the book). I had the students keep their piece of paper to always remember this lesson.
