Looking at everyday things in a new light: Great opening day project idea

Just thought I would share my experiences with a great book. I was walking in Indigo the other day when I came across this amazing book:

At first it caught my eye because I was like, "Wow this seems like a really cool book about being different. It would be great as an opening book."  Then I got reading it and I was thought to myself I think this book has many different purposes.  Here is what we did:

The book talks about all the different pebbles that you can find at the beach.  It pushes students to look beyond their surroundings and pay attention to everyday things and see them in new ways.  We had a discussion about this (which was hard for my twos).  We compared it to our own lives and how we are all unique and different and that is okay.

I then had them create their first writing samples about what makes them special and why.  Students then created rock people of themselves.

For grade two these things really turned out well.  The kids really liked the project but in the end it also taught them to reevaluate everyday things in a new light.  To be honest it was never my intention to get the kids to think this but was very surprised by the outcome.  

It is important that students learn to reevaluate their everyday life and take stock in what they have.  Its nice to see that everyday items can be very important for other uses (at least in my opinion).  It turned out to be a great not only for writing samples but art as well.