Stefanie Fleenor Seminar: Spring 2012 February 1, 2012

Context Draft

For my Term IV assignment I have chosen to focus on the topic of Africa. This was the choice for my assignment because Sam Powel Elementary School has a thematic unit for the entire school each year. This years thematic unit is Africa. Africa is an extremely board topic; therefore, I felt the need to scale it down. After having a discussion with my mentor teachers and Rosa, we decided on teaching about a specific tribe in Africa. This was our final decision because our students never receive any formal Social Studies lessons. We feel that in order for our students to be well rounded, and prepared to move to fifth grade, they need proper Social Studies lessons taught to them. After looking through books, we decided upon the Ashanti tribe of Ghana. There is much literature and history on this tribe. Our fourth graders at Powel will be able to utilize this literature to do research on their own. Another reason that we decided to choose the Ashanti is because of their location in Ghana. One of the students in the fourth grade has a grandmother from Ghana. After having several conversations with him, and after reading his journal, I learned that this child has been to Ghana several times. He is one of the more quiet students in the class. In addition to be being less vocal, he has been placed in lower reading groups and math groups. I felt that choosing a tribe in a location

he has been can give him the opportunity to become a huge asset in the class. His experiences will be beneficial to both the teachers and the students. While Rosa and I were not forced to stick with the thematic unit, we did so because our children have never seen Social Studies. This was previously stated in a cultural context; however, geographically speaking, many of our students cannot even locate Africa on a map. If they cannot locate one of the only seven continents they will ever have to know, it is crucial that their learning of geography start somewhere. Fourth grade at Powel School is a great place to start. Rosa and I plan to teach the geography of both Africa and Ghana. We plan to teach the terrain of Ghana. We plan to teach the cultural traditions of the Ashanti people. And we plan to teach the history of the Ashanti peoples. Almost every aspect of Social Studies is touched upon in this curriculum. Furthermore, this curriculum is embedded in math, science, and literacy too. A final reason why we felt it important to teach the Ashanti tribe to our students is because they are lacking in cultural awareness. While reading a story about a Vietnamese family, a photograph was discussed in which the family was sitting on pillows on the floor. Instead of recognizing that this was a cultural difference, the students automatically assumed the family was poor and could not afford chairs. With this curriculum, we hope to open the minds of the children to all cultures Furthermore, we hope to decrease judgments and biases by exposing children to the idea that there are cultures outside of the one the children are living in. These cultures have their own unique qualities, much like the cultures within Philadelphia.

I feel that students have much to gain from this curriculum. It will allow them to be exposed to different topics and will allow them to become experts in a topic they may already be familiar with.