Exposure to other cultures brings personal meaning and awareness not only in the classroom but in the home as well. Celebrating all the beautiful different cultures through exploring places around the world, their traditions, food & much more through invitations to explore, create, paint, build, & read are great ways to provide experiences to children. This meaningful information, knowledge, & awareness will introduce concepts from anthropology, history, religion, & geography at a young age.
A great way to honor and learn more about a child's cultures is to create family Heritage Collages or Trees. Before creating one, reading the store I Dream of Popo by author Livia Blackburne and illustrator Julia Kuo is a great way to celebrate how we all have different stories. The story is about a granddaughter and her Popo missing each other so much, and through traditions they share together their special connection is never fleeting. In the book the granddaughter draws a collage of all her favorite things about Taiwan and now San Diego to bridge her two lives together. This will help connect and integrate the literacy experience when creating the collage.
To create a Family Heritage Collage/Tree on a poster you can share all your families flags for their countries, cuisine, famous landmarks, language, clothing, etc. along with your family lineage. Whether you let the child draw out the pictures or create a collage with pictures they will gain more understanding of who they are in context of race, ethnic group, culture, religion, language and familial history. It also really boosts their confidence and security in the classroom or home when they get showcase who their foundation is.
