LESSON PLAN TITLE

How do Chinese people celebrate the New Year in America?

BIG IDEA

Students learn about the Chinese New Year and how the Chinese assimilate and acculturate in America.

RELATED NCSS STANDARD

Standard 1: Culture

B: give examples of how experiences may be interpreted differently by people from diverse cultural perspectives and frames of reference

ESSENTIALQUESTION

How does the way you celebrate New Year’s compare and contrast to the way the Chinese New Year is celebrated?

MATERIALS

1. Primary documents
2. Maps
3. Literary texts
4. Audio/visual aids
5. Graphic organizers
6. Handouts

• Literary text “Lion Dancer: Ernie Wan’s Chinese New Year” by Kate Waters
• Venn diagram

GOALS STATEMENT

1. Basic Skills Development
2. Procedural knowledge
3. Information knowledge

• Students will develop their compare/ contrast skills. They will also develop their skills on using their background knowledge.
• Students will become educated or further educated on the Chinese New Year.
• Students will take the information they received to plan their own mock Chinese New Year celebration for the class and their families. They will also use that information to show how Chinese culture assimilated and acculurated with American culture.

INSTRUCTIONAL SEQUENCE

1. Motivation/attention-getter
2. Review
3. Content Presentation
4. Active Learning
5. Debriefing

• Motivation: “Everybody celebrates different occasions in different ways and New Years is one of those occasions. Today we are going to read “Lion Dancer: Ernie Wan’s Chinese New Year” by Kate Waters and learn how a boy from China and his family prepare for the New Year.
• Review: Before I read the book, I want the students to share some ways they celebrate the New Year. This will help them when they fill out their Venn diagram.
• Content Presentation: I will read the book aloud, using the strategy Stop and Think to help the students think of how their New Year’s celebrations compare or contrast with what’s going on in the book. They can write down their thoughts.
• Active Learning: After reading the story, the students will use the notes that they wrote about the book and what they said out loud to fill out their Venn diagram. They can work in groups of 3. When they are finished, we will talk about assimilation and acculturation and how the Chinese did these two things in America when it comes to food, traditions, etc. I will give them definitions after asking students what they think the words mean.
• Debriefing: Share their information. I will pick 5 or 6 students to perform a mini play during the Chinese New Year celebration. The play will last no more than 10 minutes. They will have to act as if they were Ernie and prepare for the New Year’s celebration. There will be 2 Ernie’s so more than one person has a chance to be him and the rest will act as his family. I will explain this to them before the class is over.

PRACTICE: (IN-CLASS OR H.W.)

Homework

1) Do more research about Chinese New Year celebrations and your culture’s New Year celebrations by interviewing a family member.

2) Take letter  home to parent’s informing them of the mock Chinese New Year’s celebration the class is going to have which also asks them to respond to what they will donate or cook for the event. (Today is Thursday and the celebration will happen Monday during lunch and the period after which is when Social Studies takes place.)

3) The students I chose for the mini play will write down ideas and bring them to class tomorrow so they can write their scripts.

4) Continue to gather books for the library.

ASSESSMENT

On the board students will write some of their similarities and differences. In the discussion, I want to hear how the Chinese assimilated and acculturated.