English Language Arts / Social Studies: Grade 4. Where does my identity come from?

Chris, the director of Elder in the Making, is a Chinese-Canadian, who’s parents immigrated to Canada from Taiwan. And although he was raised in Calgary, he did not know much about the history of this land.

Let’s delve deeper into the connections and similarities between Chris’s and Cowboy’s experiences navigating different cultures and feeling like “immigrants in their own land”.

Some similarities:

– Attempting to navigate through two or more cultures

– Learning more than one language

– Feeling disconnected from ancestral heritage

Activity: 

Lead a discussion with your class to identify some of the differences. Invite students to ask family for help in finding an object that represents their history or culture. Share it with the others. Students will share and retell stories about what they know about their family arrival to Canada/Calgary.

Try drawing a picture of yourselves with images and symbols that represent your personal background and experiences. Share it with someone and explain your journey, discuss the similarities you recognize and identify differences.

What cultures have you discovered? What things in your life happened to you that have made you who you are? How does learning about the history of where we live and where we come from, help us understand who we are?

Feel free to share your thoughts and pictures with us. With your permission we will post them on our Facebook page and spark the conversation.

Submit a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>