November 1, 2000

Kamalii School Character Education

Teacher Name: Catherine Kalehuawehe

Grade: First

Book our class read:

Two Eyes, A Nose and a Mouth and We are All Alike, We are All Different

Describe activities done by students after reading book regarding

respect:

Students discussed what makes people the same and different. The color

of our skin, the color and shape of our eyes, the type of nose, the various

mouths, the color and length and type of hair, then our height and weight. We

discussed if we looked like our parents or different and why. Each child drew a picture

of themselves using a mirror to look at while drawing. They used various

face color crayons to color their skin appropriately. Then I told them we were

going to be doing a two month project involving not just what we look like but what

culture and nationality we come from. It would last throughout the months of

November and December, tying in with being thankful for our families and our

heritages.

List steps involved in completing this project for the web page. Include

programs used and approximate time lines:

The first week a survey was sent home asking each child to find out what

nationality or nationalities they were and which nationality did they

identify with in order to schedule weekly cultural sharings. The survey resulted in seven

weeks of celebrating various nationalities of our class, beginning with Chinese,

Japanese, Portuguese, Spanish, Samoan, Hawaiian, Filipino, Native American and

African American, and Caucasian (English, Irish, French, German).

First each child was given a colored poster board (24×36) to take home

entitled “My Culture Board”. They and their parents had to decorate it with

photos of family members, including children, parents, and if possible, grandparents. Then

they could write what type of things they did to celebrate their various

cultures and where they originally came from (including maps), what holidays or

special foods came from their culture, how they got their names and who in their

families they looked like. We had one child who was adopted from his relatives in

Samoa and his mom was actually his mother’s sister and his father was caucasian.

So he looked like his Samoan family and often knew people who saw him with his

dad, knew he must be adopted because they didn’t look alike at all. This led

to great discussions on what makes a family. Children started noticing that their

parents were also of mixed nationalities.

We made passports for each child as we traveled to their native country

of origin and stamped the passport with a stamp representing their country.

We made maps of each country and put push pins on a class map to see

where all these countries were that our families had originally come from.

During the week the students and parents shared their culture boards

first, followed by songs, dances, clothing or special holidays of their

culture. And on every “Fun Friday” we tasted foods from their culture. The cultural

boards were hung around the classroom until the entire project was finished.

We even had various school staff members, such as our principal who is

African American and our after school aide who is Portuguese and our Hawaiian

Studies teacher, come in and share during those weeks, to show the students what

nationalities our adults at school are, too.

RESPECT of how we are alike and how we are different, now made the

children not only proud of who they were and why they looked the way they did,

but to respect and be interested in each other’s cultures. The singing and

dancing activities really bonded the students together! The food sharing was

really interesting because when children really liked the food they shared they

noticed other children did not want to taste it because they had never seen it

before! They were amazed that all children did not eat the same foods, because at

school we all eat the same lunches! From Filipino pansit noodles, to homemade

Portuguese sausage, to kalua pig and poi, to French tarts we ate our way through our

nationalities!

As a final project, we took photos of the children sharing their cultures, from food to

dances, to clothing and had each student go to the computer lab and

using Claris Works for Kids type up a description of what was happening in

their photo. We selected a few to share on our RESPECT web site for Character

Development.

I, as a teacher, noticed that a few students who before were self

conscious of some characteristic of themselves, such as the African American/Caucasian

girl with long hair that was always very hard to comb and control, or the

Filipino boy who spoke with an accent, were not embarrassed as much anymore after seeing,

sharing and now knowing why they have that type of hair, or that accent.

It is part of their culture and their heritage, and they could identify with other

people in the school that were their nationality and had the same characteristics. It

was a GREAT two months of learning and practicing how to RESPECT all

characteristics of people!

– Catherine Kalehuawehe