Let's Learn about Countries & Cultures Around the World!

Hi friends!

It's Ashley from That's So Second Grade!

I can't wait to share some of the latest happenings from my little world of 2nd grade here at the Primary Chalkboard!

In response to a graduate school project that I was given, as well as an effort to enhance one of our 2nd grade social studies standards, I decided to have my kiddos really spend some time learning about cultures in various countries around the world.

Last year my 2nd graders were thrilled to learn all about Africa.. but this year... I wanted our study of cultures to be an extravaganza of cultural excitement! So far, so good.

We have just had one big month of learning about and exploring cultures in places ALL OVER the world! I mean.. talk about excitement! 

To kick start our study, I used a set of international folktales from fellow Chalkie & friend, Deana of Primary Punch. 

Then my sweet kiddos selected countries to research and the fun began! 

Throughout our unit, we have learned to use encyclopedias, almanacs, and E-books to gather information about our countries. My kiddos have worked with their partners to read some of MY FAVORITE nonfiction books to learn about their country and to learn about the daily life of children who live there.

 

These books are seriously NON-NEGOTIABLES when it comes to learning about countries and cultures around the world!

 

I think my little ones would say that there favorite part of the research has been reading the (fictional) letters that I wrote from the perspective of a child in each of their countries. They LOVED learning about the daily life of kids in these different places around the world and were fascinated to see that while many things were different about their lives, lots of things were the same. Each of my students wrote a letter back to their fictional friend in another country! Boy was that an interesting letter!

Currently, we are working on an extension (thank you, graduate school) project to our project. Is that even possible? Each of my students took 8 different photographs that portray a different part of their daily life. We will be working on writing captions to go with each of our pictures and will be compiling them into a book about the "Daily Life of a Child in the USA". WOWzers. I CANNOT wait to see how these turn out!! 

Can you say culture overload?

Now that we can say hello in 11 different languages, I think our mission is accomplished! I've got one group of globally aware kiddos!

If you think researching cultures might spark the interest of your little ones, then grab this {FREEBIE} graphic organizer that I created to help us collect information as we researched. 

Please note: it was created to print on legal size paper!

Cultures Research Graphic Organizer FREEBIE

If you are interested in more activities from my cultures project, check out the pack below!

Au revoir! Ciao! Sayounara! 

Thanks for stopping by the Primary Chalkboard!