Lesson Plan: The Summer Olympics
By Amanda Winter and Tamara Kerr, VIF teachers
Materials required:
- Computer with internet access
- Art materials
- KWL chart
- World maps/atlases
Vocabulary:
Olympic, Greece, athletes, competition, continents, culture, customs, international
Essential Questions:
- What are the Olympic Games?
- What does the Olympic symbol of the interlocking rings represent?
- Which countries participate in the Olympics?
- What are the cultural characteristics of the countries in the Olympics?
Lesson Objectives:
- Students will learn about the countries that participate in the Olympics.
- Student will comprehend that each country has customs that are understood and accepted by its people.
- Students will study familiar and unfamiliar customs of other countries.
Focus and Review
- Introduce the lesson by playing a short musical clip of the opening ceremony of the Summer Olympics.
- Let students share what they know and what they want to know about the Summer Olympics and the participating countries by using a KWL chart.
- Use a mind map to pinpoint students’ ideas of the events, people, countries, and symbols that are associated with the Olympics.
Teacher Input
Discuss with the students that the Olympic Games is an event held every two years that brings skilled athletes from around the world to participate in friendly competition. The Olympic Games is also a chance for people from countries and cultures around the world to learn about one another.
Introduce the Olympic symbol of the interlocking rings and that it represents the union of the five continents and the meeting of athletes from throughout the world at the Olympic Games. In this representation, the Americas are viewed as a single continent, and Antarctica is omitted. The 5 continents represented are Africa, America, Asia, Europe and Oceania.
Group Work
- Divide the class into five groups assigning a continent (ring) to each group. Using the Internet, students should complete a list of countries in each continent and identify which ones are participating in the Olympic Games. The list of countries of each group can be displayed within the center of each ring on a large display of the Olympic rings in your classroom.
- Each group should select three countries located on their assigned continent and research the countries’ culture, food, dress, music, national flag, symbol, climate, geographical location and at least one Olympic athlete from that country. A poster can be made to include the details of each country. Each group will make an oral presentation to the class about their countries using their poster.
Closure/Assessment
- Redirect the students back to the KWL chart and ask them to complete the last column (What have I learned?).
Expansion Ideas:
- Students can create their own Olympic song, poem, rhyme or song.