Mr. Brown’s Precepts

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Area: History and Social Studies, Literature/Language Arts, Other Areas
Grade Level: High School & Beyond, Middle School, Primary/Elementary School
Topics: Beauty, Courage, ethics, Friendship, Right/Wrong, values, Wonder
Estimated Time Necessary: 45 minutes, but can span several sessions if you do multiple precepts

Lesson Plan

Objectives:
Thinking together about various precepts and whether they seem right.
Thinking together about the various precepts the teacher, Mr. Brown, offers his students in the book Wonder which cover an array of philosophical topics. This will work whether or not students have read the book.

Many 4th, 5th, and 6th graders have read the book Wonder by R.J. Palacio and will be familiar with Mr. Brown’s monthly precepts. These are inspirational sayings the teacher, Mr. Brown, puts on his board monthly for his students. For example, the precept for September is “When given a choice between being right or being kind, choose kind.”

You can look through all of Mr. Brown’s precepts and think about them together. This would make for a good philosophy session with a group or a discussion at home over dinner.

Do you think the precept is right? Are there exceptions to the precept that need to be considered?  Are there situations where following that precept could cause unfortunate consequences?

You can find Mr. Brown’s precepts in the book if you have it, or there is a list here.

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Resources

This lesson plan was created for PLATO by: Karen S. Emmerman, PLATO Education Director.

This work is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0

If you would like to change or adapt any of PLATO's work for public use, please feel free to contact us for permission at info@plato-philosophy.org.