February 8, 2012

Subject: Multicultural Day

Is coming…March 1^st.  

We were hoping to present all of this during a staff meeting, but the snow day thwarted that!  So we’ll do this by email and let us know if you have questions.  We’ll try to get on the agenda after conference week to check in and see how things are coming together.

Now is the time to begin thinking about which country your class will study. Remember, each bay has a continent that you will feature with a banner in your bay. First grade bay has Asia, and we are going to highlight Japan, China, and India.

The committee members are available to talk to if you need any help with this.  We can offer ideas or help trouble shoot anything that may come up.  There are some art activities that Heather will hold aside for this if you want to look at any of that. We can read a story coming from that country, tell a folktale, learn a song, play a game, write a poem, or do an art activity all highlighting the country of study.  

Each teacher will teach at least one lesson to their class on the country. On the day of the event, you will also be teaching a lesson to about 3 other classrooms that will rotate to your room. Each class that you teach WILL have a support person with them.  Those lessons will be about 25-30 minutes in length.  It can be the same lesson or something different.  We will be getting the rotation schedule out soon and you will know exactly which grade you will be having for those lessons.

Next week may be a good time to do some of this work since they are half days and the schedule is off anyway.  We could even do an art activity during our Valentine’s Day party if you want to use that time for it. Some of us might be able to use this as our non-fiction reading during literacy time possibly.   Now that grades are done, let’s take a moment for something different and we hope will be quite fun for everyone. There is WELPA (ELL) testing going on so there are no interventions all week.

Have fun and we look forward to seeing all of the wonderful work highlighted from around the world by our students.

Cultural Competency Committee.