During this Advent season, my girls and I have studied Christmas traditions from around the world. I've always loved exploring various traditions and foods at Christmas. I still fondly remember learning about a buche de noel in French class (which I still aspire to make one year). In German class, I was touched by the story of West Berliners placing candles in their windows that faced East Berlin (when the Berlin Wall was still in place) to spread Christmas love to their fellow man. I regularly watch Rick Steves' European Christmas special. Simply put, I love this stuff.
This year I found a curriculum from teacherspayteachers.com for a study of Christmas around the world. Clare and I have had a blast going through each country. Meg and Anne have followed along a bit reluctantly. To be fair, Meg loves geography and social studies and usually adds some fantastic insight to our discussions. She, however, also has about fifteen things she wants to do at any given moment and can be torn in her dedication to a single project.
Rather than going straight through the curriculum (which organizes the chosen countries in alphabetical order), we have selected countries as they correspond with feast days during Advent. For example, we talked about Germany for St. Nicholas Day, because Germany has a long tradition of celebrating St. Nicholas Day. We talked about Mexico for Our Lady of Guadalupe Day. At times, we would discuss countries for convenience sake. On the day of Clare's piano recital, which was late in the day and prevented me from making dinner, we talked about Japan. Why? Because Kentucky Fried Chicken is a popular Christmas Dinner choice in Japan due to a successful marketing campaign in the 1970s. We picked up KFC on our way home from the recital and completed our worksheets while eating our chicken.
This year I found a curriculum from teacherspayteachers.com for a study of Christmas around the world. Clare and I have had a blast going through each country. Meg and Anne have followed along a bit reluctantly. To be fair, Meg loves geography and social studies and usually adds some fantastic insight to our discussions. She, however, also has about fifteen things she wants to do at any given moment and can be torn in her dedication to a single project.
Rather than going straight through the curriculum (which organizes the chosen countries in alphabetical order), we have selected countries as they correspond with feast days during Advent. For example, we talked about Germany for St. Nicholas Day, because Germany has a long tradition of celebrating St. Nicholas Day. We talked about Mexico for Our Lady of Guadalupe Day. At times, we would discuss countries for convenience sake. On the day of Clare's piano recital, which was late in the day and prevented me from making dinner, we talked about Japan. Why? Because Kentucky Fried Chicken is a popular Christmas Dinner choice in Japan due to a successful marketing campaign in the 1970s. We picked up KFC on our way home from the recital and completed our worksheets while eating our chicken.
At times, we were aided by events in our area. For example, the Saint John Paul II National Shrine hosted a fantastic Saint Nicholas Day event. Children could meet Saint Nicholas dressed in his Bishop garb. There were numerous craft stations that included making a paper advent wreath or a miter (a bishop's hat). Inspired by the story of St. Nicholas, children could toss bags of coins down makeshift chimneys in a unique take on a bean bag toss. The entire event was fantastic. At home we followed this event up by making German Potato Dumplings with roast beef as well as German Springerle cookies with St. NIcholas stamps on them.
In my next post, I will talk about our Santa Lucia Day activities, which were also great fun.
In my next post, I will talk about our Santa Lucia Day activities, which were also great fun.
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