Level: All School – Rally Level – Fun, Energetic, Celebratory
Grades: 3-5
School Quarter: 3
Related Grade Level Activities:
All-School Cultural Festival
Activity: Discovering Personal and Cultural Uniqueness
Inspired conversation topics:
- How is New Mexico unique?
- How are you unique?
- Lesson to define ‘unique’ to understand comparison to other places, considering some students may not have been outside of New Mexico
- Form for teachers to request brochures of cultural places
- NM Place & Culture Coloring pages
Theme Alignment: Historical Reflection and Progress
Contemplating where New Mexico and the nation were 250 years ago, where we are today, and the journey taken to get here; and history as a lens to inform our futures.
Toolkit Overview (In this toolkit):
- Background
- Step-by-step guide or how-to checklist to implement a schoolwide festival
- Resources
Background:
In 1776, New Mexico already had multiple cultures contributing to the unique character of the region. Since then, people from all over the world have come to call New Mexico home.
How To:
Link to Implementation / How to
- NM History Overview as recommended the NM History Museum
- Introduce New Mexico History with the appropriate Human Timeline Activity
- Do the appropriate Historical Timeline Worksheets
- At a museum
- In class
- Online using the museum website
Resources
- Human Timeline Activity for 3rd grade
- Human Timeline Activity for 4th grade and older
- NM History Museum Timeline
- Historical Timeline Worksheets 3rd and lower
- Historical Timeline Worksheets 4th and up
- Links to explore NM Cultural Places:
- UNESCO
- National, State, and local Parks/Forests/
- New Mexico for Kids: Learn & Explore! Video
In Classroom Activities:
- Overview of diversity of New Mexico’s population
- Point out lesser known histories, including black colony established in 1900s, Buffalo Soldiers
- European groups, including Italian and German
- Asian, particularly Vietnamese (after fall of Saigon), Korean, Filipino, Chinese, South Asian