Group Assignment 2

BME637 : The Class : Introduction : Culture 2 : Group Assignment 1

Tell the kids your Story

To complete this assignment successfully, you should:

Study the assignment carefully
Complete the assignment as directed

In multicultural classroom contexts most teachers focus their attention on the various cultural backgrounds of the students. Sometimes students and parents are asked to discuss their backgrounds and to help celebrate cultural events. Books are also used in this endeavor. But it is rare for teachers to share their own cultural backgrounds. As funny as it may seem, many students only observe teacher activity in the realm of schools and they are often shocked to see a teacher shopping like "normal" people at the local mall. Communication, I believe, is a two-way street. If we believe that learning about a student's culture will help you understand him/her a little more, then it makes sense that students will also understand teachers more if they share their cultural backgrounds, too.

It is proposed, therefore, that if you share a bit of your own culture with your students that this may have a positive effect in your classroom. As your instructor I have already shared my background and few stories about my life. As my students, I want to learn something about you. This is your chance.

1. For our own BME 637 class, write a short children's story about some aspect of your life and post it in the VCC "Children's Story,"for others to review. It should have a beginning, middle and an end. There should be an overarching message/moral within the story. The story could be illustrated along with the narrative. The story should be written with your students' reading and writing ability levels in mind. The length of the story is dependent on the story itself. There is no minimum nor maximum number of pages. Be sure to provide a personal title to your story e.g., "My Visit to Grandma's Hogan,"and the grade level of the children to whom you will present. You might also want to post it along with an audio-track narration of the story. Each BME 637 student will review at least four stories and provide comments on them. This is one way we can begin to learn about one another.

2. Once you have posted your story on your VCC Portfolio, then share your story with your own students and report on what happened (the effects) during and after the storytelling. If you currently do not have a teaching assignment, share your story with children in or out of school and report on the effects.

Once you have completed this assignment you should:

Go on to Ishmael
or
Go back to What is Culture? Part 2