School activities

Examples of classroom activities, structured in terms of a set of rethinking questions and a set of replaying exercises.

Rethinking Questions

Replaying Exercises

Why do People Emigrate?

What are the similarities and differences between contemporary and turn of the century immigrants?

Oral Testimony Project: Moving Stories

1) Working with a partner, video-tape an interview with one person who has immigrated to Canada. Find out why that person decided to move here.

As a class, watch all the interviews. Then work together to edit the interviews and add commentary to create a documentary about immigration to Canada.

Other suggestions:

Students could find our if any documents having to deal with immigration (for example, passports, visas, ticket stubs, etc.) exist in their family and what the attitude is towards them.

Students could also find out if any diaries, daybooks, correspondence, etc. exist in their families. These materials are an example of the importance of the immigrants' own record of their immigration. They serve to remind us that we cannot understand immigration just from the sources of the host society. We must see immigrants as actors making decisions in their own immigration, then and now.

These documents could be digitized, xeroxed and/or exhibited.

What is a Neighbourhood ?
Community History

Students are introduced to the complex role and ambience of old and new immigrant receiving areas.

With a small group of classmates, choose a local neighbourhood to study. Each group in your class should choose a different neighbourhood. Students may study their own "turf" including: residence (single family, multi-dwelling, etc.); location; history; land use; residents; age and materials (Victorian, brick, wood, etc); focal points, etc..

Take photos or make a video to create a visual presentation about the neighbourhood. Include informative captions with your photos or a taped commentary with your video or film.

What is a Stereotype?
Stereotypes in the Media

Divide your class into four groups to analyze the media for one week. One group will focus on television commercials, one on television shows, one on newspapers, and one on magazines. Each group will study how people ( people of colour, women, men, members of different ethnocultural groups, disabled people, First Nations people are represented in the media, using the following questions as a guide:

How often do you see a real variety of people in the media?
What roles (major/minor, positive/negative) are different people in the media playing?
How often do you see examples of generalizing and stereotyping?
How often does the media present more than one point of view?

Record your observations in a history journal for the one-week period. Then meet with your group to discuss your findings, and write a group report to present to the class.

Once all the groups have presented their reports, discuss and compare your findings as a class. Combine your group reports to create a media analysis.

Related theme: The Ethnic Press

Canada often provided the first opportunity to publish what one wished. And people, who before emigrating did not read newspaper because of marginal literacy, poverty, repression, or a limited social world in which word of mouth was sufficient, developed a need to maintain ties with their own kind and their homeland. There is also a tendency to trust an interpretation of events presented in their own language by men and women who share not just their mother culture, but also their migration experience and the new ethnoculture it was producing.

Student could gather ethnic newspaper they see in their neighbourhood or talk to people in small stores or their family about what newspaper they read or did read.

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Rethinking Questions	Replaying Exercises
Why do People Emigrate? What are the similarities and differences between contemporary and turn of the century immigrants?	Oral Testimony Project: Moving Stories 1) Working with a partner, video-tape an interview with one person who has immigrated to Canada. Find out why that person decided to move here. As a class, watch all the interviews. Then work together to edit the interviews and add commentary to create a documentary about immigration to Canada. Other suggestions: Students could find our if any documents having to deal with immigration (for example, passports, visas, ticket stubs, etc.) exist in their family and what the attitude is towards them. Students could also find out if any diaries, daybooks, correspondence, etc. exist in their families. These materials are an example of the importance of the immigrants' own record of their immigration. They serve to remind us that we cannot understand immigration just from the sources of the host society. We must see immigrants as actors making decisions in their own immigration, then and now. These documents could be digitized, xeroxed and/or exhibited.
What is a Neighbourhood ?	Community History Students are introduced to the complex role and ambience of old and new immigrant receiving areas. With a small group of classmates, choose a local neighbourhood to study. Each group in your class should choose a different neighbourhood. Students may study their own "turf" including: residence (single family, multi-dwelling, etc.); location; history; land use; residents; age and materials (Victorian, brick, wood, etc); focal points, etc.. Take photos or make a video to create a visual presentation about the neighbourhood. Include informative captions with your photos or a taped commentary with your video or film.
What is a Stereotype?	Stereotypes in the Media Divide your class into four groups to analyze the media for one week. One group will focus on television commercials, one on television shows, one on newspapers, and one on magazines. Each group will study how people ( people of colour, women, men, members of different ethnocultural groups, disabled people, First Nations people are represented in the media, using the following questions as a guide: How often do you see a real variety of people in the media? What roles (major/minor, positive/negative) are different people in the media playing? How often do you see examples of generalizing and stereotyping? How often does the media present more than one point of view? Record your observations in a history journal for the one-week period. Then meet with your group to discuss your findings, and write a group report to present to the class. Once all the groups have presented their reports, discuss and compare your findings as a class. Combine your group reports to create a media analysis. Related theme: The Ethnic Press Canada often provided the first opportunity to publish what one wished. And people, who before emigrating did not read newspaper because of marginal literacy, poverty, repression, or a limited social world in which word of mouth was sufficient, developed a need to maintain ties with their own kind and their homeland. There is also a tendency to trust an interpretation of events presented in their own language by men and women who share not just their mother culture, but also their migration experience and the new ethnoculture it was producing. Student could gather ethnic newspaper they see in their neighbourhood or talk to people in small stores or their family about what newspaper they read or did read.