Education Short List

The winter holidays are quickly approaching, teachers are excited about being able to integrate some fun, alternative, creative lessons. But, while still enjoying the celebration it is just as important to acknowledge and learn about something other than just Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Teaching Tolerance created a great resource of lessons for just this purpose. The part that I think is the best is that these lessons aren’t just geared toward elementary-aged students (as it common during this time of year); so educators are able to give their high school students something different as well.

http://www.tolerance.org/activity/school-holiday-calendar?ttnewsletter=ttnewsgen-111509

Halloween is just around the corner; and this is a fun time for teachers to bring in creative lessons, plus some arts and crafts. But what about older students? Or for children who don’t celebrate Halloween? Do they just get left out? Unfortunately that answer is usually yes. I actually had a girl whose family did not want her celebrating or participating in holiday activities. I always felt so bad for her, missing out.

Here, I have found several sites with lessons that incorporate the general fun feeling of Halloween, ones that create learning lessons for older students, others are focused on the seasons, another brings a thought provoking lesson into the history of Halloween, one tells us about what our Halloween costumes really say, and a few surprises. This list of lessons and sites should give teachers the chance to incorporate something different without excluding any of their students.

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http://www.edhelper.com/halloween.htm

http://www.edhelper.com/pumpkins.htm

http://www.edhelper.com/DailyThemes_November_1_2.html

http://www.edhelper.com/Autumn.htm

http://www.tolerance.org/activity/what-do-halloween-costumes-say

http://www.atozteacherstuff.com/Themes/Halloween/

http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/teaching-topics/teaching-topics-halloween/

http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/10/23/the-horror-the-horror/

http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/2002/10/31/frighteningly-fabulous-festivals/

Hispanic Latino Heritage Month

September 15 was chosen as the starting point for the celebration because it is the anniversary of independence of five Latin American countries: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. They all declared independence in 1821. In addition, Mexico, Chile and Belize celebrate their independence days on September 16, September 18 and September 21, respectively.

For educators, this is an opportunity to celebrate diversity found in your classroom and/or your community. Personally, I believe that diversity should be integrated into lessons all the time, and that we shouldn’t necessarily focus on people’s racial backgrounds. However, having a dedicated time to honor the accomplishments of people from Latino decent should still be acknowledged.

Here is a grouping of six websites that are dedicated to providing teachers and instructors with materials and lessons that are directly related to teaching about Latino Heritage Month. And although the month of celebrating this month ends on October 15th, several schools and districts continue these types of lessons until the end of October.

EDUCATION WORLD LATINO LESSONS

http://www.educationworld.com/a_lesson/lesson/lesson023.shtml

SCHOLASTIC HISPANIC LESSONS

http://teacher.scholastic.com/activities/hispanic/index.htm

SMITHSONIAN’S EDUCATION HISPANIC RESOURCES SITE

http://www.smithsonianeducation.org/educators/resource_library/hispanic_resources.html

TEACHING TOLERANCE SITE

http://www.teachingtolerance.org

TARGET’S DREAM IN COLOR SITE
http://scholastic.com/dreamincolor/

IMPORTANT FIRSTS BY HISPANIC AMERICANS

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0933896.html