Transcript Teaching Tolerance & Celebrating Diversity

Enriching Life Lessons with
Technological Tools
Click here to view an exciting
introduction video!
Prepared by: Kristyn Sanborn
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Overview
Findings
One World Classrooms
Tolerance.org~ Fight Hate and Promote Tolerance
Kinder Art
Kids.gov: The Official Kid’s Portal for the U.S.
Government
◦ Vandergrit’s Children’s Literature Page
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Practical Applications
Closing Remarks
Additional Resources
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This power point focuses on how technological tools can enrich
and enhance student learning of diversity and tolerance. The
United States is a county of many cultures, and it is important to
teach students to understand, appreciate, tolerate and celebrate
all people. Technology can be used to support curriculum,
reinforce teacher instruction, and enrich student learning.
In my research, I found many websites and services applicable to
students, classroom teachers, school counselors, parents, and
administrators. These sites come from an array of categories,
including: professional organizations, community organizations,
education ranging from Kindergarten through Higher Education,
Government, commercial sites, and individual sites. In the
following report, I will discuss five especially interesting websites
I came across in my research. Please review my findings at your
convenience and I will appreciate any feedback, critique, or
suggestions!
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Non-profit organization that connects students
from around the world
Online learning labs
Language labs
Virtual pen-pals
Students will explore culture, geography, travel,
food, art, dance, education and much more in a
fascinatingly interactive atmosphere
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Rationale
As our world becomes more interdependent and the problems we
confront more global, it is critical that our young people gain
knowledge, skills and attitudes that prepare them to enjoy the
benefits and accept the responsibilities of global citizenship. To do
so, they must interact with and learn from their international peers;
just as, as adults, they will live and work with people from different
cultures in both local and global settings.
Students
With grounding in self-knowledge and self-respect, OneWorld
Classrooms students reach out and make connections with their
world neighbors. In doing so, they express who they are, cultivate
cultural-awareness, and develop the capacity to collaborate across
borders and foster international friendship.
◦ Bridges of Learning
 To effectively build bridges of learning, OneWorld Classrooms
addresses the needs of students and teachers on both sides of
cross-cultural exchange. We create dynamic learning
experiences through which students:
 value themselves and their own culture
 recognize the similarities between cultures that make all people
a human family, and
 respect and appreciate the differences that make each culture
unique.
◦ At the same time, OneWorld Classrooms:
 enhances the curriculum
 grates technology into the classroom
 uses the arts as a means to communicate and share across
cultures
 empowers teachers and students to make learning more
interpersonal and meaningful, and
 provides a means for traditional societies compromised in the
wake of globalization to explore their own cultures and share
them with their new world community.
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Professional site that offers a wealth of
information on diversity and multiculturalism
Information for all ages of students with links
for kids and teens
Educators: lesson plans, activities, articles,
contests, community building, links
Parents: age appropriate information for
teaching your child(ren) tolerance
Just months ago, the nation was patting itself on the back for our
collective diversity progress — a woman (Hillary Clinton — D), a
Latino (Bill Richardson — D), a Mormon (Mitt Romney — R) and an
African American man (Barack Obama — D) — had all declared their
candidacies to become the next President of the United States.
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And then the politics got rolling, as did questions about diversity:
Is America ready for a female Commander-in-Chief? (And, by the
way, is Hillary dressed for the role?)
Is America ready for a president who is Latino? (In one national poll,
we actually admitted we were not ready for Bill Richardson.)
Is America ready for a Mormon president? (And, as a Mormon, does
Romney qualify as Christian?)
Is America ready for a black president? (And, uh, is Obama black
enough?)
Are the white male candidates at a disadvantage, given the diversity
that surrounds them?
Leading into and through Super Tuesday, a new set of diversity questions
emerged:
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Would women —white, brown, black and "other" — voting in the
Democratic primaries exercise gender allegiance and vote for the white
woman?
What about the white men voting in the Democratic race? Would they
choose the white woman (racial allegiance) or the black man (gender
allegiance)? (We assumed black men would vote for the black man, so we
didn't even ask a question as to whether they'd vote for a white woman.)
On the Republican side, could the Latter Day Saint hold onto the
conservative vote, after a Baptist pastor's win in Iowa? Could he
withstand the advance of John McCain, who often is perceived as a
moderate, and, among other things, that means conservatives do not
see him as "an evangelical"?
Everything is wrong with these lines of questioning, and everything is
right about them, too. Unfairly, they set up litmus tests about voters'
capacity to demonstrate "color-blindness," "gender-blindness" and an
embrace of diverse faiths. They ignore the fact that some of us are many
things at once — female, Hispanic and
born-again, for example. The questions assume Americans
don't vote "on the issues" and are compelled by identity factors alone.
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Educational and commercial site that is a
great tool for teachers and counselors to find
multicultural lesson plans for art projects
Visually and tactilely enhance learning of
other cultures
Diversity themed art activities
Book Recommendations
A BOX OF CRAYONS
 Grade: K+
Age: 4+
 Submitted by: Eileen Urbanski, a teacher at Avon
Village Elementary School, in Avon OH
What You Need:
 crayons, pencils, markers
 paper
 the poem A Box of Crayons
 crayon pattern
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What You Do:
 Read the poem "A Box of Crayons" to your students. It is about the different
colors getting along and liking each other.
 Then, children draw their portraits on a die-cut crayon pattern.
 Place all the crayons into a giant box of crayons that you can create using
construction paper (see photo).
Poem
 Click here to find the poem: Box of Crayons.
 Extra Poem to Hand Out to Students
 Wouldn't it be terrible? Wouldn't it be sad?
If just one single color was the color that we had?
If everything was purple? Or red? Or blue? Or green?
If yellow, pink, or orange was all that could be seen?
Can you just imagine how dull world would be
If just one single color was all we got to see?
Recommended Books:
The Crayon Box That Talked
by: Shane DeRolf
In Shane DeRolf's deceptively simple poem, a child's box of crayons conveys
the sublimely simple message that when we all work together, the results are
much more interesting and colorful.
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Excellent government website
Students can learn about the government and
laws, learn about the Bill of Rights and the
Constitution, and partake in Social Studies
interactive activities to explore different cultures
Many resources for educators; including lesson
plans, celebrating holidays, and great ideas for
class trips
Also great for supplementing a multitude of
other topics including career development, and
health
Government Sites
 Asian Cultures - (Smithsonian) - Learn about Asian art from neolithic times
to the early 20th century.
 Creating French Culture - This Library of Congress page gives an overview of
French history through the eyes of the art and culture of the times.
 Egyptian Mummies - (Smithsonian) - Learn about how mummies were made
in Ancient Egypt.
 Egyptian Pyramid - (Smithsonian) - The pyramids of Egypt fascinated
travellers and conquerors in ancient times and continue to inspire wonder in
the tourists, mathematicians, and archeologists who visit, explore, measure
and describe them. Learn more about them.
 History & Archaeology - Smithsonian Magazine - (Smithsonian) - Read these
interesting articles on science and technology topics.
 History & Culture - Smithsonian Education - (Smithsonian) - This site has
resources for both American and World History.
 Kids and Families Page - (Library of Congress) - This website shares its
collections, stories, online collections and more for students and teachers.
 My Wonderful World - Explore the rich online resources created by
Smithsonian experts for learning more about our world!
 People and Places - Smithsonian Magazine - Read these interesting articles
on people and culture.
 Portals to the World - Portals to the World contains selective links providing
authoritative, in-depth information about the nations and other areas of the
world.
Other Resources
 African Art: Aesthetics and Meaning - Check out the exhibit's amazing
masks, headresses and wood carvings.
 Civilisations - This interactive site examines key events in the development
of any given ideology or religion, including Communism and its diffusion
across the world.
 Countries of the World - FactMonster - This site has all kinds of information
about countries in the world, including: geography, maps, flags, history, and
rulers.
 Kids Post - Get the scoop on current events and entertainment, homework
help, and have fun with games, polls, and more from The Washington Post.
 Languages Around the World - Kids around the world speak thousands of
different languages! In this section you can learn some new words in a
different language.
 Religions Around the World - Learn about the many religions around the
world.
 United Nations Cyberschoolbus - This great site for students has access to
country profiles, a well-written introduction to the history and work of the
United Nations, and some fun quizzes (such as the one on national flags) and
the Urban Fact Game, which is a creative on-line quiz about cities and their
populations.
 World Flag Database - This sites show flags from countries around the world.
Also includes basic facts on each country such as its
population, capital city, languages, currency and religions
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Individual and educational website that gives
important information on the use of
children’s literature to teach and promote
diversity
Information on the use of race, class, gender,
religion, and much more in regard to picture
and chapter books
Resources for further exploration on teaching
students about diversity through literature
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If we are ever to achieve a culture of inclusiveness that empowers all
human beings, we must begin with young people. We cannot control
what goes on in individual homes, but we can, and must, actively
seek to ensure that our schools and libraries respect the many
peoples who share our world, regardless of national origins,
religious beliefs, sexual orientation, class, race, or gender. Feminist
and multicultural practices can and must make a difference.
All schooling is political. The time has come to ensure that public
education represents a politics of Inclusion, not exclusion. We ought
to respect young learners' abilities to think, speak, read, and act. We
should respect their abilities to comprehend, construct, and
communicate meanings in various communities and contexts. These
need to be the aim, the process, and the result of education.
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Technology will enrich student’s lives in a way that
could not be previously done
Students can interact with students across the world
and learn about countries and cultures
Teachers and school counselors can supplement
curriculum with a variety of lesson plans, classroom
activities, and web resources
Administrators can research how to implement
tolerance and diversity into their school district
through service learning project ideas, and tips for
educating faculty, parents, and students
Parents can now have a resource in aiding important
conversations to have with their child(ren) in 2008
Please click here to listen to a closing audio
message!
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Kristyn Sanborn’s Personal Website
Internet Address Book
Research Excerpts
Research Report