Today is Martin Luther King, Jr. Day; and students at Northstar Elementary in Knoxville have been spending the last few days learning about Dr. King and the impact the civil rights movement had on our history.

4th grade teacher Jessica Gulllion tells KNIA/KRLS News lessons have included Dr. King’s use of nonviolence, and how the power of words led to change in our society.

“We talk about how words can change a day for anybody; we start with a video about Martin Luther King, Jr. to kind of get the kids to visualize what’s going on, and then we go into some reading passages about him, and then I assign a reading passage on line,” Ms. Gullion says.

While the students get a view of how American life has changed, there’s also an awareness that the attitudes which feed into prejudice still exist. Ms. Gullion says helping children learn to be kind and open to others, and showing them how to pass kindness along, is a lesson she wants her students to take with them from learning about Dr. King and his legacy.