Express Yourself

Challenge students to use language to share with the world who they are and what they believe and stand for.

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One thing about teaching - we are always teaching 2 things at once. We teach our subject, the topic, and the pointed objective of what we want our students to know, achieve, and do.

For us English language teachers it is something related to language. But we also teach wider, higher-level skills like creativity, thinking skills, critical evaluation, discernment and even things like happiness, fulfillment, pleasure, confidence, and self-motivation.

One great approach that teaches both language and also creativity is to have students express their beliefs, and selves through making a manifesto.

It’s easy to do. Show students some examples. Then, maybe on the board or screen, make a class manifesto using set categories. Finally, provide students with a template to write/draw their own manifesto. The first draft will be a rough copy. Then after being corrected, and proofed, provide a template for a final copy.

Subscribers - get our pre-made templates for manifesto making and self-expression at the end of this post.

Finally, share your manifestos. Put up on a webpage or a class or school bulletin board.

It’s an inspiring lesson and activity! Another option in the same vein is to have students express themselves by personalizing the design of objects - a T-shirt, a mug, a welcome mat, a billboard, a tattoo. What would they say, draw, and add to the object to personalize it? Here are some examples. Get this full set of printables as a subscriber - below.