ENRICH LEARNING USING MY HERO FREE LESSON PLANS, RESOURCES AND PROJECTS

Teachers' Calendar: Each Day Introduces Free Multimedia Lesson Plans and Resources

MY HERO Educators QuickStart Guide includes links to lesson plans and multimedia resources to enrich learning whether in the classroom or virtually. Lesson plans are organized by grade level and subject. 

MY HERO Library Media Specialist QuickStart Guide also has links to stories, art, short films, and audio celebrating the best of humanity. The MY HERO Teachers Room has resources and lesson plans organized by themes and grade level. Students are able to submit their own projects to MY HERO honoring heroes within their communities or the world for publication. Great resource for librarians, media specialists and teachers.

If you only have a little time for a MY HERO moment:

Want your students to be able to honor someone's heroic qualities or actions and share it with a global audience? Have them sign the MY HERO Guestbook. There will be a slight delay showing up on the page, as we review each entry to make sure only safe, child-friendly content appears on MY HERO.
MY HERO will not post any entries that contain swearing, or promote hatred, violence or prejudice.

If you want to have your class explore the concept of heroism and the behaviors and values we admire:

Use this essay about heroism to begin the discussion about choosing a hero and the difference between a celebrity and a hero.

Share a lesson or unit about Finding Our Heroes (elementary, middle or high school).

Join the MY HERO Forum to discuss heroism. 

Use MY HERO Multimedia Resources to Enrich Social Emotional Learning

These curated stories, art and short films demonstrate the SEL Competencies of: Self Awareness, Responsible Decision Making, Social Awareness, Self Management and Relationship Skills. Discussion questions are included. 

Use MY HERO Multimedia Resources to Explore Character Traits and the Heroes that Demonstrate these Values.

Students are encouraged to submit their own stories, artwork and short films that honor those individuals who exemplify these character traits through the Create program. 

Explore our rich multimedia library if you have enough time to read a story, view a short film, look at a piece of hero art, or listen to an audio segment.

 USE MY HERO'S LIBRARY OF STORIES ABOUT HEROES. MY HERO stories support basic literacy goals while providing inspiring and hopeful content.
Below are links to Language Arts Lessons and Activities organized by grade level:

Elementary Students
Middle School Students
High School Students

Listen and Read Along at the Same Time

Have students listen as they read along to curated stories that have text with audio for enriched learning and differentiated instruction.

An extension is to have your students write and publish their own hero stories, then read them aloud and add them to our audio library using the Create Program.

Set your students loose to explore and find their favorites, then report back to the class with what they found. Rest assured that the films are appropriate for middle school and older students. Here is a link to a collection of short award winning films  appropriate for a younger audience and family viewing

Here's a simple lesson plan.

The Film Library is a perfect place to practice media literacy lessons: Who created the medium? Why did they create it? What is the message and how do they convince you? How does the message relate to you?

MY HERO’s mission is to use media and technology to celebrate the best of humanity and to empower people of all ages to realize their own potential to effect positive change in the world. Our hope in providing these free media arts education resources is to support all levels of media makers with the tools needed to produce meaningful hero stories that can be shared with our global audience.

VISIT THE MY HERO ART GALLERY TO EXPLORE HOW HEROISM CAN BE VISUALIZED

You'll find work in all kinds of media by professional and student artists.

MY HERO puts heroes in categories, based on their actions. You can browse art by these categories or by type of art medium.

LISTEN IN TO THE MY HERO AUDIO ROOM

Browse Music, Narrative, and Poetry to find the sounds that will inspire your students.

EXPRESS HEROISM WITH SOUND

A simple tutorial gets students started creating and publishing their own song, poem, or narrative. Spoken word is always welcome!

Have Your Students Become Published Writers, Artists and Filmmakers Using MY HERO

MY HERO has all the authoring and publishing tools you and your students will need.

Teachers start by registering as an educator and creating a class code.

Students register using the class code. They create their own hero content, which can be curated into a class showcase webpage organizer.

Teachers publish the class page(s) for the MY HERO global audience and share them with your school, community, and the online global MY HERO world.

The CREATE PAGE will be where students identify the kind of medium for your project, using it to make their own media pages. There is a Tutorial for Students on how to use the Create Program to publish their projects. 

HAVE YOUR STUDENTS WRITE STORIES ABOUT THEIR HEROES

Elementary School students

Middle School students

High School students

HAVE YOUR STUDENTS CREATE HERO ART

What does heroism look like? Is it a portrait of a hero? An illustration of heroic actions? Visual storytelling in frames? 

While art teachers can use heroism as a subject for their existing art lesson objectives, general education teachers can incorporate hero art as an alternative creative and publishing experience. Here's a tutorial to get your started.

HAVE YOUR STUDENTS CREATE HERO-RELATED FILMS

Use MY HERO's Screening Room and curated lists of films for examples.

Online video production is challenging, relying on whatever students have at home to work with. We adapted the PBS NEWSHOUR Student Reporting Lab's lesson to creating a hero interview video.

Student films can be simple, edited interviews with titles and credits. We have lessons to support that. 

Want your students to create a narrative, documentary, or experimental films, but you're not a film-making teacher? No worries! MY HERO has extensive Media Arts lessons to walk you through every step of pre-production, production, and post-production. 

Publish your student films on class organizer pages and have your own virtual screening! 

For additional resources and lesson plans, visit the MY HERO Teachers Room.

For example, in the teachers room you will find Language Arts lesson plans and resources organized by grade level. There are multimedia Science lesson plans and resources, which includes Ocean Conservation, also organized by grade level. 

LEARNING CIRCLES, a partnership between The MY HERO Project and iEARN, put teachers and students in touch with other classes around the world.

Tutorials for teachers and students.

HOWEVER MUCH TIME YOU HAVE, USE MY HERO RESOURCES AND PROJECTS TO INSPIRE AND BRING HOPE TO YOUR STUDENTS.

MY HERO's team of educators review all submissions to ensure that work is appropriate and does NOT promote hatred, violence, racism or sexism. 

If you are interested in mentoring or have questions about using   MY HERO with your students, email: [email protected]