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What a School Believes: Making New Friends and a Better World

Photo courtesy Lundahl Middle School

This article is one in a series at 麻豆精品 that profiles the heroes, victories, success stories, and random acts of kindness to be found at schools all across America. Read more of our recent inspiring profiles at The74million.org/series/inspiring.

Lundahl Middle Schoolers have so much to believe in. Laughter and love. Individuality. Helping the homeless. Peace and forgiveness. Making new friends. Family. The list seems endless, hopeful, inspiring.

And it all came from sixth-graders writing with chalk on an 鈥淚 Believe鈥 wall inside their Crystal Lake, Illinois, school.

Learning came from the wall too.

Teachers Kim Chudick and Cynthia Nero created the wall across from Nero鈥檚 classroom after Chudik鈥檚 daughter showed her the lyrics and music video from Shawn Mendes鈥檚 popular song 鈥淏elieve.鈥

Kicking off the project with a discussion of the lyrics and the video鈥檚 visuals, students collaborated on discussions about messages, beliefs, kindness, and current events.

鈥淭he kids didn鈥檛 realize they were learning,鈥 Chudik told the . 鈥淚鈥檓 always looking for ways to keep the kids interested and take everything beyond the classroom.鈥

Students then researched current issues and wrote paragraphs about what they had learned. The assignment included different types of media, themes, messages, tone, mood, and even poems and songs.

Then they went to the wall 鈥 just like the one in the video 鈥 writing down powerful expressions of what was most important to them.

鈥淚t鈥檚 helping us to express who we are,鈥 student Molly Mareci told the paper. 鈥淧eople just judge people by the way they look and not the way they should be seen.鈥

Respect played a key role in the project 鈥 students needed permission to write on the wall and couldn鈥檛 erase any other student鈥檚 statements. 鈥淚t really made them think about what鈥檚 important to them,鈥 Nero said. 鈥淪ome kids wrote some really insightful things.鈥

Plus, as student Grace Collingbourne told the newspaper, 鈥渋f you believe enough, it might come true.鈥

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