Look Who's Talking!
|
Teacher Tips
The students and the teacher should spend time getting to know one another. Use activities that range from knowing each others names to knowing things about the interest, talents, and families. Kagan Publishing and Professional Development (http://www.kaganonline.com/) has produced a set of activities on Smart Cards called "Building Classroom Relationships." When students and teacher know one another, they are more respectful and caring of one another and more likely to tolerate each others' differences and find solutions to differences they do not understand.
You may help students get started on the journey of exploring cultures by participating in several activities at the Peace Corps website, including "Americans," "Brief Encounters," "Chatter," and "Everyone has a culture -- Everyone is different." As the teacher, you can prepare yourself by reading Culture Matters -- The Peace Corps Cross-Cultural Workbook and completing the independent activities. Complete publications are available as free downloads at http://www.peacecorps.gov/wws/publications/looking/.
Assign the cultural group rather than allow students to choose (e.g., Mexican–American, Puerto Rican, Asian–Indian American, African American, Jewish–American, Amish, Japanese–American, Somali, Arab American, Arab American who are Muslim). Select cultures (based on your community population) and have student-pairs draw culture-names from a bag to gain assignments by chance. A full range of cultures should be selected by the teacher for study. To assure a culture is studied and presented comprehensively, the teacher may have more than one group study one culture. Repetition is essential to help students remember. Group students in pairs and let them draw their culture. Leaving it to chance reduces the fairness concern many middle-school students experience when a teacher assigns them an option.
Make sure students practice their presentations with a loud voice and that both partners share in each presentation. What they present must be heard and understood by everyone in the classroom. Have them videotape their presentation and show it to the class, if this is preferred by you or the students. When students watch themselves on video, they often are able to see the quality and want to improve it. Another advantage to this is that students can take it home and show and involve their parents in their school work. On the day students are presenting, hold them accountable for information they are hearing about other cultures. Have students complete Venn diagrams comparing cultures. They must list 25 or more descriptors in all three areas of a double Venn. Double Venn diagrams are possible, but triple Venn diagrams are more difficult and not recommended at this level.
For assistance in managing questions in the classroom, read Managing Project Based Learning: Principles from the Field, by Mergendoller and Thomas (2002), http://www.novelapproachpbl.com/PBLResearch.htm.
