I will start by organising a ‘Games From Around The World’ event which can involve the children in their classes and their House Groups. This way they can learn with their peers and also in mixed age groups situations to support each other.  I can involve the class teachers, PE staff and Senior School Sports Prefects to help to teach and run different games.  The children can rotate around some of the games.  This can be included as part of the school’s PE sessions and House Activities.

We can also video these games and post the footage and rules / equipment for the parents.

I could also work with the PE, Music and Art specialist teachers to plan a creative / performing art focus from ‘Around The World’.  This work could include cultural dances, art from artists around the world and songs / traditional music.

These events can be both short and long term.  The games from around the world can continue to be included in PE sessions and hopefully played during break times.  The songs and dances could be used for brain breaks and the maps can be added to as the year progresses.

This could then encourage families to share games, artists and songs from their own cultures and therefore continue to strengthen the learning community.

-        Learning a different language (being multilingualism) is an instrument to overcome cultural barriers. Exposure to multiple languages can be integrated into the program and curriculum in various methods. For example, in our school, students learn French as a second language and in this way, they will be able to learn more about the French culture because language is one way to define a culture. 

-        Organizing cultural day to celebrate diverse and rich cultures. On this day, the school can hire a DJ who will be responsible for music to keep the event moving and entertain the students (the DJ can be the music teacher). Since music is part of the culture, the DJ can play different types of music, such as Indian, American, Spanish, Arabic, etc. Further, school can encourage the parents to send native food with their children. By bringing native food, other students will learn more about the style of eating among different countries. 

-        Meeting different teachers from different schools around the world and ask them to let the students learn more about different cultures through communicating with each other. Through sharing diverse cultures and traditions, students will respect and learn about the different cultures that exist around the world. 

-        Introducing students to multicultural children’s stories/ books that celebrate diversity. These books include different ideas and information about cultures, race, language, and traditions. They are written in a way that the pupil will find it informative and entertaining.  For instance, “Same, Same, But Different”, “We’re Different, We’re Same” are some examples of stories that can used in read-aloud sessions. 

In my opinion the previously mentioned short-term and long-term strategies can introduce students to international- mindedness. The strategies can be done with the collaborate of specialists, such as the music and the art teacher. Additionally, the PYP coordinator who will aid in facilitating the cross cultural communication through meeting with different schools and asking to plan one or two sessions in which the students can meet online and interview each other to learn about different cultures. The parents will be involved as well, especially in preparing for the culture day. 

To check what the students have learned, assessments can be done, whether formative or summative. For example, we ask the students to do a poster explaining what they learned or through exhibition in which they have explore, document, and share their understanding of the topic/concept. Another way is to ask them to reflect on their learning through connect, extend, challenge. 

     
A.  Multi-Cultural Children’s Book: 

·      Children's book invite children to use their imaginations, expand their vocabularies and gain a better understanding of themselves and others. 

 

·      Children's literature serves as both a mirror to children and as a window to the world around them by showing people from diverse groups playing and working together, solving problems and overcoming obstacles.

 

·      Multi-Cultural Children’s Book reflect the diverse groups of people in the world around them. Children can learn to respect not only their own cultural groups, but also the cultural groups of others.

 

1.    The Colors of us 

2.    It’s Okay to be different 

3.    This is how we do it.

4.    We’re different, We’re the Same 

5.    Same, Same, But Different

      B.   Have Students Explore Their Own Cultural Traditions

Ask your students to speak with their families about common things or traditions in their cultures. Topics such as: holiday traditions, special stories, cultural foods or even language. Students might be fascinated to discover what their classmates call their: grandparents, aunts and uncles. We can ask students to share what they discovered with the class!

 

    C.      Have a World Music Dance Party

Investigating the music of various nations and cultures is another fun method for celebrating cultural diversity in the classroom. Have students bring in music that represents their cultural heritage. Students can also bring in or share instruments that are specific to their culture’s music. Moreover, they can use videos on YouTube or Internet to teach their classmates about songs and dances from different regions of the world. We can ask students to listen to particular instruments in the songs and discuss with them about what makes each song or dance unique: 

1.    Is the music fast or slow, loud or soft?

2.    Are the movements small and subtle, or big and bold? 

We can even try some of the dances as a class!

      D.     Make Global Friends

I believe that learning and meeting people from different countries and cultures is really important and embraces open-mindedness.  

We can use a site like ePals to pair students up with a partner from another school in a different country. Ask the students to send messages to their new global friends. In my opinion, discussing different seasonal traditions is a great way to get students share and learn about one another.

Making friends from different countries and cultural groups will be an excellent way to get your students excited to learn about different world cultures. 

    E.    Inclusion and Equity: 

Accepting kids with special needs in schools and providing them with the necessary adjustments and adaptations, as well as addressing the value of equity with students, will help them embrace open-mindedness.

F. Field trips: 
Students, in my opinion, need to investigate and live specific experiences related to open-mindedness.
As a result, organizing field trips to museums and art galleries, as well as inviting a guest speaker to convey a new idea, concept, or belief, will assist students in connecting with and reflecting on what they have and what others have. 

It aims to develop inquiring, knowledgeable and caring young people who help to create a better and more peaceful world through inter-cultural understanding and respect. These are some activities to accept, respect and understand ourselves and others. I hope that it will help you to develop the international mindedness as it works in our school well.

v  This experience can help the students a good opportunity to understand the other cultures easily and efficiently. This aims to accept , respect both locally and globally.

v  Our  learner profile reference posters are a great place to begin. We want them to be interactive however, rather than static wall decorations.

v  You can create the interactivebulletin board with the intention of developing the children’s awareness of how our learner profile comes into play every single day. 

v  Promoting international mindedness, provoking critical thinking , looking at experiences close to home, personally and globally.

v  We begin with books. Books provide us with beautiful examples of the attributes in action within characters that can be relatable. Childern can make connections with how the attributes look when out into action. 

v  Give the children the opportunity to make those connections throughout the school year, by keeping a record of the books read.

v  Does anyone’s culture influence one’s name?

*Briefly reflect on your own name and then share the

story with your partner trying to include:

*What is significant about your name?

*What does it mean?

*Where did your name come from?

*How does it reflect your culture, family and experince?

Ecological water wastage, environmental problems, pollutions and global warming

You can use technology to connect across cultures and geographical regions to create globally- oriented learning environments and displays.