Objectives
I believe our nation overall is learning more and more about the dynamics of immigration, migration, and their affects upon cities because we have a great need right now to understand the powerful issues stemming from such movement of populations. The conflicts and current events surrounding this topic are great reminders that there are many different cultures in our nation, city, community, and our own school but how do we understand what makes us different and how can we better interact with one another bypassing our immediate unkind reactions in a diverse environment. For me, the first place to start in this journey of understanding is education, especially background information and making connections to this history. There is an abundance of history to learn about regarding our own East San Jose community, the city of San Jose, and our state of California, and I am creating this unit to pull out key concepts and understandings for my first grade students to learn what is appropriate at their level of development and comprehension using such basic academic themes as "My Family and My Community." I want my students to feel proud of their family heritage and who they are because of their family immigration and migration history. It is meaningful for them to connect with the important academic concepts of history as changes over time, but to also realize that we are all different and have our own immigration stories to respect and share. My students need to know this makes them each special, and that they carry their own unique legacy to add to the cultural wealth of the community. Ultimately, I want to teach these young ones tolerance and compassion for one another no matter their skin color, race, or station in life with strategies to seek respectful understanding as we target California State Standards of History and Social Science for "A Child's Place in Time and Space."
This unit addresses first grade curricular themes of Family and Neighborhood. It also addresses many required standards in Common Core ELA and Math, California State Standards HHS and VAPA. (Please refer to Appendix A for unit connection to standards.) Children's books, music, dance, and videos found through research will help introduce different cultures and celebrations. This unit is filled with activities that not only cross over the various areas required in the standards, but it highly engages students with multifaceted learning opportunities. This unit also includes mandatory texts from the Treasures reading curriculum used across areas in Language Arts, Art, ELD, and History and Social Science. The texts include fiction, realistic fiction, non-fiction, and folktales. It involves read aloud stories about different family histories and cultures. Students will practice describing words, story telling, and illustrating. Ensuring collaboration strategies, students will participate in large group, small group, partner, and buddy activities.
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