This activity works best for younger students who might not be familiar with common symbols. Make a worksheet with a variety of symbols down one side of the page. You can include traffic signs, national flags, corporate logos, scientific symbols or anything else. One the other side of the page, list one or two sentence meanings, in random order. Have students draw a line linking the symbol to its proper definition. Correct the activity out loud as a group so students can see their mistakes and learn from them.
There are more symbols in the world than most students can count. Have your class work together to come up with a comprehensive list of symbols in the world. Let the discussion go on a long time and write their suggestions on the board. Ideally, students should move beyond obvious symbols to include things such as the faces in Mount Rushmore, for example, or the Lincoln Memorial. Use the comprehensive list to have students think about what makes a symbol. Ask them who decides that one object will stand for something else.
The musician Prince famously changed his name to a graphic symbol. Have your students do the same, using their creativity and imagination. Let students use colored pencils, markers or paint to draw a symbol that represents them. You can even allow them to make a three-dimensional symbol using modeling clay. Have students think about the qualities in themselves that they most prize, and what symbol they can come up with to encompass those qualities.
Symbolism is also a literary device that authors use to convey meaning compactly and intensely. Read a poem, story, novel or play as a class and have students come up with a list of important symbols in the text. You can ask them to decide which is the most relevant symbol and why. Or, you can divide the class into groups and assign one symbol to each. Have the groups mine the text for every instance of that symbol. Groups should come up with a short presentation on how the meaning of that symbol is established and changes throughout the text.