TeachRock

“Martin Luther King, Jr. Day is not only for celebration and remembrance, education and tribute, but above all a day of service.” – Mrs. Coretta Scott King 

Within TeachRock’s MLK Holiday lesson plans for Elementary, Middle, and High School classrooms is an activity that prompts students to describe how they would participate in a MLK Day of Service. But what is a MLK Day of Service?

The federal Birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr. Holiday that our nation observes every January was passed by Congress and signed into law in 1983. However, in 1994, legislation and executive action expanded the scope of the holiday. The King Holiday and Service Act of 1994 became law “to support the planning and performance of national service opportunities in conjunction with the Federal legal holiday honoring the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr.” Mrs. Coretta Scott King, Dr. King’s widow, explained that the national day of service “is a day of volunteering to feed the hungry, rehabilitate housing, tutoring those who can’t read, mentoring at-risk youngsters, consoling the broken-hearted and a thousand other projects for building the beloved community of his dream.”

In honor of this MLK Holiday, consider leading your classroom, school, or local community in a day of service during the upcoming holiday, or at other times throughout the year. Use the image below, which can also be found in the lesson plans linked above, to begin a MLK Day of Service. Additionally, a student-facing version of the lesson plans is available as a slide deck for streamlined classroom instruction or independent student exploration. 

Read the text below and then describe how you would participate in your MLK Day of Service.

Explore the King Holiday and Service Act of 1994 legislation at this link.

View President Bill Clinton signing the King Holiday and Service Act of 1994 into law at this link.