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Five Easy Ways to Help Students Learn About Culture

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Five Easy Ways to Help Students Learn About Culture (181KB PDF)

1. Global Connections. Ask students, “Which countries do you have a connection with?” Then have students look at their clothing labels (or other items). On your VIF world map, have students place pins in all the countries where their clothes were made. Use yarn to connect these pins to one placed in students’ hometown.

2. Essential Questions. To get students thinking about culture’s influence on attitudes, behavior and values, post an essential cultural question in your classroom for students to ponder. Examples: How does where you live influence how you live? How do your beliefs and values influence the way you behave? *

3. Tongue Twister. Teach your students an unfamiliar tongue twister in English or in your native language.

4. Different Perspectives. To help students become aware of different perspectives, post articles from online newspapers or magazines in your classroom. Articles could highlight current events in your home country. Or you could post articles from several different countries that focus on the same event or issue.

5. Computer Homepage. Set your classroom computer homepage to an international newspaper website or some other internationally-focused age-appropriate site (see below for ideas!).

Web Resources

1. What the World Eats (Time Magazine, from the book titled “Hungry Planet: What the World Eats”) http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1626519,00.html?iid=redirect-globaleats Exit VIF Program
Find out what’s on family dinner tables in fifteen different homes around the globe.

2. Intercultural Time Machine
http://www.argonautonline.com/?pid=801 Exit VIF Program
See how world cultures organize their time differently.

3. Coverdell Worldwise Schools/Peace Corps
http://www.peacecorps.gov/wws/educators/lessonplans/section.cfm?sid=4 Exit VIF Program
Exercises and activities specifically designed to help students understand cultural differences.

4. Culturosity.com – Come Grow Your Global Mind
http://www.culturosity.com Exit VIF Program
Resources to learn about other cultures, grow from these experiences, and make global awareness a natural part of our daily lives.

5. Global Trek
http://teacher.scholastic.com/activities/globaltrek/index.htm Exit VIF Program
This interactive site lets you plan world travel (a la Expedia or Orbitz), but with an educational twist.


* "Questions from the “Building Bridges: A Peace Corps Classroom Guide to Cross-cultural Understanding” document found at: http://www.peacecorps.gov/wws/publications/bridges/pdf/BuildingBridges.pdf Exit VIF Program (568KB PDF)