For the past week, I have been working on speeches with my sixth graders. Teaching them the structure was a lot easier than I thought it was going to be and surprisingly they learned a basic essay format from doing a speech. Anyway, their topic was what they wanted to change in the world. Their speeches were awesome! Here is a sampling of some of the things they wanted to change:


Stop killing black people
Clean up the city-- too much broken glass and trash
More trash pick-up
Too many kids on the streets
Get rid of Bush
Stop the war (and in particular stop black people from getting sent to war)
Give everyone a mansion like Usher
No more beatings at school
Fix up the school and classrooms
No more uniforms
Stop children from being kidnapped and raped
College should be free
Make it so adults don't have to work two or three jobs
Going to the doctor should be free
Too many guns on the streets

These are eleven and twelve year olds....talk about critical thinking skills....