It’s no secret that we have a huge soft spot for children writing and enjoying postcards. There’s something about their awe at the mysteries of mail, the delight at checking the mailbox, and the effort they put into each word that just never gets old. 😊
This year for the World Postcard Day, we thought it would be a good idea to do something for the little ones, and after some thinking, we hatched a plan try to help teachers give a class about postcards. Because we’re not teachers ourselves, we enlisted the help of Kristin (aka volvomom), who is an educator in the Boston area. She introduced us to the idea of Understanding by Design, a backwards education concept that focus on the results before considering which learning activities will best meet those goals.
The goals are simple: we want students to understand how mail works, and invite them to send a postcard on October 1st! So we’ve laid out a few ways of achieving this result, listing videos on mail topics as well as tasks that teachers and students can try. We’ve done our best to make the lesson plan flexible enough to accommodate different grades and also different subjects, in order to fit as many classrooms as possible.
We’ve also enlisted the help of some postcrossers to translate the lesson plan into different languages, and so in addition to the English version, there are now versions in French and Russian (by michelle_2012), Dutch (by avanesdonk), German (by frewen and killewips) and Spanish (by Loli-ts) — you can find them on the World Postcard Day page. Thank you ladies, you’re awesome! 👍
If you’re a teacher, feel free to grab the World Postcard Day lesson plan and use it in your classes on October 1st! And if you’re a parent of school children, we invite you to send it to your child’s teachers — it’ll be a great way for them to participate in the celebrations, and be a part of this global movement.
PS – 22 days and 12 hours until the World Postcard Day!
25 comments so far
Really cool idea. I'll share it with some teachers I know.
I ❤❤❤ Postcrossing!
Great idea . Wishing all of you a happy World postcard day in advance 😊😊😊
very good idea. thanx a lot
I want to go back to school)
Excellent resource! My students will enjoy this. Thank you!
Wow. These lesson plans would fit in very nicely prior to National Geographic's "Geography Awareness Week" , traditionally held the third week of November. (Some postcards may take that long to arrive.)
Postcrossers seem to be more "geographically aware" every time they send/receive a postcard, but there are some people who may still need some help finding places, especially those cities/countries we constantly hear about in the news headlines. Special thanks to Postcrossing's educators for developing these plans.
Love this! Thanks to all the contributors :)
I can use it at my work. Working with seniors with memory-loss. It is a great program to do with them. They gonna love it, to send a postcard to one there love-ones, specially now in the Covid-19 time!
So October the first is busy/lovely day for me.
Thank you.
I'll be glad to translate it into Italian! 😊
Great post. Thank you.
greaaaaaaaat,.
Great idea! :)
Great!!!
I am so honored to be working on this project! I cannot wait to see the results! Please free to join our Education Section on the forum, too! Whether you are public or private school educator, homeschooler, or volunteer - let's collaborate!
I hope tons of people will use the lessonplan and spread the love for mail and especially postcards!
I AM a teacher, I make my pupils writing letters and postcards (in French) and that's a great idea and ressource... thak you very much!!
I still remember when I learned how to write, address and stamp a letter in 3rd grade, about 50 years ago. Good to hear that at least some pupils still learn about mail nowadays.
Four of my pen pals are teachers and I sent the link to them and two have already replied and think this is an excellent idea and will be writing postcards with their students!
Yesterday I received a postcard from an 11 year old boy, and I saw that it was the first postcard he sent in postcrossing. For this reason, it is special...
What a great way to help students figure out how to make a connection with another person. Additionally, there is the practice of handwriting, grammar and punctuation. Finally, the knowledge that the card arrived!
Love the idea of a World Postcard Day 👌 . I also love the winning postcard design 👏👌😍 .
I have my grandchildren for homeschooling on Fridays. Because World Postcard Day is a Thursday we are going to be working on our postcards the following day. Thank you very much for the lesson plan and for creating World Postcard Day!
thank you
Our in school (Brest, Belarus) I teach lessons from postcrossing. I said history postcard and look my collection my postcards (in school library). Child is like, and I`m pleased.
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