Prep Time: 45 minutes       Lesson Time: 30-45 minutes   Age: All

Areas of Study: Math, Writing

Summary

Background/objectives: The purpose of this activity is to get students to know what they should and should not bring with them if they need to evacuate their homes due to a hurricane.

Materials: 

• Pictures of items that should be brought during a hurricane
• Pictures of items that should not be brought during a hurricane
• Poster sheet
• Glue
• Scissors
• Markers
• One copy of the “Emergency Supply List”

Preparation: Search the internet for pictures of items on the “Emergency Supply List” (see Resources), as well as pictures of things that are valuable, but should not be given first priority when packing up to evacuate (extra clothes, shoes, and hats, sporting equipment, bicycle, computer, appliances, electronics, furniture, videogame consoles, etc.  Base the selection of these items on the age of your students).  Print one copy of each picture you want to use.

Procedure:

1. Explain to the students that you will be pretending that a hurricane is approaching Louisiana, and that you are all going to be evacuating in the same car together.  However, there is only a limited amount of space for your things, and you will need to choose wisely in deciding what to bring with you.
2. Lay out all of the pictures on a table, and based on the number of students, have each one pick out a set number of items (i.e. if you have four students, and twelve items from the “Emergency Supply List,” then have each student pick out three items)
3. After the students have made their selections, show them the Emergency Supply List, and go over which of their selections were correct (on the List) and which were wrong (not on the List).  Have students with wrong selections trade their items out for correct ones.
4. When everyone has Emergency Supply items, have the students create a “Supply Kit” by cutting out their items, gluing them on the poster sheet, and labeling their items.
5. Hang your supply kit on the wall for everyone to see!

Assessment

After the activity is over, ask kids why they made the choices they did.  Ask them how items such as duct tape and can openers could be very important when evacuating for a hurricane, even though their monetary value is much lower than things such as electronics

Tips and Tricks:

How to implement for…

Pre-K-K: Pick out good items and bad items as a group.  (or) Sort the items into the two categories before starting the activity, and then ask students to identify which group of items they should take in an evacuation and which group they should not take.  See how many of the items students can identify.  Try to incorporate coloring of the items.

1-2: May need help identifying some of the Emergency Supply items.  Use fewer “do not bring” items than “do bring” items.

3-6: The main thing to focus on with this age range is drawing the line between what is necessary to pack in a hurricane evacuation and what is not.  Use an approximately equal amount of “do brings” and “don’t brings.”

Resources:

Emergency Supply List: http://www.ready.gov/sites/default/files/documents/files/checklist3.pdf