Puzzle with Preteens 

I went to NativityMiguel middle school this week with my internship class. We worked with the 7th graders who are leaders of the school and also come from many different ethnic backgrounds, which we wanted to incorporate into the directive.

There were 2 tables set up and when they walked in the room the class naturally split into boys and girls. I sat at the boys table to help them out. The students were each given a puzzle piece to draw anything that represented their where they were from, there family, nationality, ethnicity, etc. It was a lot harder to get the boys to participate than the girls. To start the boys would sit around saying “I don’t know” when asked about their backgrounds; it was only when you picked up on something they didn’t think you noticed did they start talking. One boy ended up just drawing scenes from Stranger Things 2, since that was a show he watches with his family. The two boys sitting across from me started off by drawing a food that has to do with their family and then continued to mumble to each other but once I realized they were speaking a different language to one another and asked them about it they opened up some and explained that they’re both from Mexico and incorporated that into their pieces.

The leaders within the class really came out when it came time to put the puzzle together. When finished the idea was to bring all of their different backgrounds together to make up one whole group, to really see themselves as a class standing together.