Cover of THE NAME JAR
THE NAME JAR
📚
Friendship 1st & 2nd Grade
By Yangsook Choi

Book Guide

THE NAME JAR

A story that explores friendship and opens a conversation with your child.

★★★★★ Loved by families
Read the Guiding Questions Find this book →
♥ This book teaches: Friendship. showing up for someone else.

Before, During & After Reading

Guiding Questions for Parents.

Definition: A friend is someone you like spending time with because they make you feel happy and special, and help you when you need it.  In short: Build bonds that last forever. Summary: Unhei, newly arrived from Korea,  faces some challenges on her first day of school in America. Insensitive kids on the bus make fun of her name, causing her embarrassment. Once she enters her classroom, she decides not to use her own name and doesn’t tell her classmates her Korean name. She tells them she will choose an American name. The next day at school her classmates give her a jar filled with names written on scraps of paper that she reads without choosing any of them. As the days go by and she continues to ponder possible American names, she meets a new friend, who surreptitiously helps her make the best choice.       Lesson Objectives: 
  1. Students will be more respectful to others from different cultures than their own, and even try to learn words from other languages that their classmates speak.
  2. This story can be a link to studies about Korean culture. 
  Guiding Questions: 
  1. What did Unhei’s grandmother give her as a farewell gift? 
  2. Why was the first day of school difficult for Unhei? 
  3. What did Unhei find on her desk at school? 
  4. Do you like your name? Do you know if it has a special meaning? 
  5. What did Unhei show her new friend Joey and what did she give him? 
  6. How did Unhei and Joey become friends? 
  7. Describe how you became friends with someone. What happened first and how did you get to know each other better? 
  8. If you wanted to help someone who is new to your school or neighborhood, what steps would you take to help them fit in? 
  9. Have you ever tasted kimchi? Does your family prepare special food from your culture? If so, describe what it is. 
  10. Ask your parents and grandparents if their names have a special meaning. 
  
🌿   Virtue Connection: Friendship means showing up for someone else, consistently.

About the Story.

This guide is part of the Values & Virtues library, a free collection of 400+ book guides and activities organized around 12 core virtues for children from pre-K to 6th grade. Each guide includes Guiding Questions designed to open a real conversation with your child in 10 minutes or less.

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