LESSON PLAN
Your Name: Kim Plyler
Title of Lesson: How do we fix poverty?
Grade: 8th grade
STANDARDS
Discuss the character traits (e.g., respect, responsibility, fairness, involvement) that are important to the
preservation and improvement of constitutional democracy in the United States. (PO 2)
Write informative/explanatory texts to examine a topic and convey ideas, concepts, and information through
the selection, organization, and analysis of relevant content. (8.W.2.)
LESSON SUMMARY/OVERVIEW
On the last day of poverty we will attempt to end on a happy note and talk about how we can fix
poverty. We will look at different organizations that are trying to help those in poverty and their
effectiveness. We’ll look at the book When Helping Hurts by Steve Corbett and Brian Fikkert. We will
also look at organizations that simply throw money at the problem. Then we’ll look at organizations that
empower the poor like Kiva. We’ll discuss microloans. Finally the students will write a short
informational essay about Kiva loans and why they are more sustainable than other methods of helping
the poor.
OBJECTIVES
Students will investigate what Kiva loans are and why they are a more sustainable option than other methods
of helping the poor and construct a short essay to explain their findings.
ASSESSMENT/EVALUATION
Students will construct a short essay (2-3 paragraphs) that accomplishes the objective.
PREREQUISITE KNOWLEDGE
Prior to this class students will need to have a clear definition of what poverty is, who it affects, and why it
happens which we will cover in preceding lessons
MATERIALS
When Helping Hurts
Kiva website
Paper
Document Camera
Kiva stories
Graphic organizer
VOCABULARY/KEY WORDS
Microloans: a very small, short-term loan at low interest, especially to a start-up company or self-employed
person.
Entrepreneur: a person who organizes and manages any enterprise, especially a business, usually with
considerable initiative and risk.
TEACHING PROCEDURES
Procedural Steps (Step by step instructions for teaching the lesson):
1. First, we will review what poverty is, who it affects, and why it happens by reviewing our definitions
and discussions from earlier in the week.
2. Class will brain storm how to help those in poverty
a.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Students will pull from things that they’ve heard in the news, things they may do for the
poor or things that we have talked about this week in regards to poverty. Teacher will also
give some ideas if students are having trouble. (ex. Food banks, Salvation Army, Red Cross,
Samaritan’s Purse, ect)
Class will categorize ideas into sustainable and unstainable ideas in the attached graphic organizer.
From the book, When Helping Hurts, teacher will read marked passages and explain how some
organizations simply throw money at poverty without actually fixing the problem and discuss how
that is an unstainable way of helping
Teacher will introduce Kiva and microloans if it was not brought up and discuss it further if it was
mentioned. We will look at the Kiva website. We will also look at stories of people who Kiva has
helped one of which students will choose for their short essay.
Once students understand what Kiva is and what they do they will answer the following prompt in 23 paragraphs. Prompt: Choose a Kiva story. Tell generally what Kiva is, who the story is about, what
Kiva did for them, and what systems Kiva affects in this particular situation. Then write one
paragraph telling if you think Kiva is sustainable help for the issue of poverty and why or why not.
RESOURCES
Dictionary.com
Kiva.org
When Helping Hurts
WAYS OF THINKING CONNECTION
Students will look at different ways to help alleviate poverty in the world. They will look at both sustainably
and unstainable ways of helping. The student will then write about one of the more sustainable ways. This
will connect to systems thinking. Throughout the week the students will be considering what systems are
affected when people are in poverty. On day one and two they will be writing about what systems are
affected. On day five the students will write about how systems will be affected through the sustainable way
of helping.
Sustainable









Unsustainable








