Muhammad Ali Lesson Plan: Individuals’ Contributions and Identities

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This lesson accompanies the BrainPOP topic Muhammad Ali, and supports the standard of analyzing individuals’ contributions to society. Students demonstrate understanding through a variety of projects.

Step 1: ACTIVATE PRIOR KNOWLEDGE

Ask students:

• Think of an issue you want to solve in your community. Why is this issue important to you? What ideas do you have to solve it? 

Step 2: BUILD KNOWLEDGE

• Read the description on the Muhammad Ali topic page.
• Play the Movie, pausing to check for understanding. 
• Have students read one of the five Related Reading articles. Partner them with someone who read a different article to share what they learned with each other.
  

Step 3: APPLY and ASSESS 

Students take the Muhammad Ali Challenge and Quiz, applying essential literacy skills while demonstrating what they learned about this topic.

Step 4: DEEPEN and EXTEND

Students express what they learned about Muhammad Ali while practicing essential literacy skills with one or more of the following activities. Differentiate by assigning ones that meet individual student needs.

• Make-a-Movie: Produce a biopic of Muhammad Ali highlighting his achievements as an athlete and activist.   
• Make-a-Map: Create a concept map identifying and explaining events and ideas that influenced Muhammad Ali’s development as an activist.  
• Creative Coding: Code a digital museum exhibit featuring symbols and figures to represent Muhammad Ali’s accomplishments.   

More to Explore

Time Zone X: Muhammad Ali: Place historical events in chronological order in this interactive timeline game. 

Famous Historical Figures Unit: Continue to build understanding around individuals’ contributions to society with BrainPOP topics.

Teacher Support Resources:

• Pause Point Overview: Video tutorial showing how Pause Points actively engage students to stop, think, and express ideas. 
• Learning Activities Modifications: Strategies to meet ELL and other instructional and student needs.
• Learning Activities Support: Resources for best practices using BrainPOP.