<p>This collection includes instructions and ideas for a classroom activity designed to get children and their families talking and creating together. It is suitable for K-5 classrooms, as an art, English, or social studies-based activity. Included here are examples of student work (images and video of students reading their books), as well as images from classroom displays.</p> <p><span></span><span></span>In this activity, a 1st grade teacher from a bilingual school in Washington, D.C., used what we called the "Connections" handmade storybook design to have her students share important family lessons. She described how she did the activity: "I loved the book project and found that it was a way to get parents involved in making a book with their child at home. I pre-made the books since I thought the instructions were a little tricky. The instructions were to discuss and write about a Life Lesson that their families taught them. Our students created bilingual Spanish/English books. The format was perfect for this because it could be English on one side and Spanish on the other. Students enjoyed hanging their books up outside of the class for others to read and then sharing them with the class. It really helped them to understand what important life lessons families teach them and it helped to bring students' home knowledge into the classroom. We connected the books to our Life Lessons unit and plan to do the same thing this year."<span></span></p> <p>This project is based on a handmade book design that can be found, along with several others, in another collection: Fun for the Whole Family: Making "Family Memory" Storybooks: <a href="http://learninglab.si.edu/q/ll-c/1tozk88HXhnFBU6d">http://learninglab.si.edu/q/ll-c/1tozk88HXhnFBU6d</a>.</p>

<p>In this collection, Educator Ramsey Weeks (Assiniboine, Lenape, and Hidatsa), from the National Museum of the American Indian, talks about Native American Ledger Art, and shares ideas for family and classroom "winter count" activities. The activities are suitable for English, art, history, and social studies classrooms.</p> <p>The collection also includes information and resources about Winter Counts from the National Museum of the American Indian, the National Museum of Natural History, the National Anthropological Archives, the Smithsonian Institution Archives, the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, Smithsonian Libraries, and the Smithsonian Office of Educational Technology</p>

<p>This collection contains assets and resources designed to help teachers (art, English, ESOL, social studies, and media technology), museum educators, and community-based informal learning educators recreate their own "Today I Am Here" project, based on the specific needs of their classroom or learning community. </p> <p>The "Today I Am Here" book is a wonderful classroom activity, made from one sheet of paper, in which students can share their family stories. The design of the book works well for a K-5 classroom display, and helps to show the breadth and diversity of the class and to encourage cross-cultural understanding. The project also works extremely well with ESOL students of any age, although the teacher will need to be prepared for possible difficult issues to surface. </p> <p>Included here are instructions to make the book, examples of student work (images and video of students reading), as well as images from classroom displays.<br></p> <p>The book design is one of many available in another collection: Fun for the Whole Family: Making "Family Memory" Storybooks: <a href="http://learninglab.si.edu/q/ll-c/1tozk88HXhnFBU6d">http://learninglab.si.edu/q/ll-c/1tozk88HXhnFBU6d</a>.<br></p> <p><br></p>

<p>This collection looks at examples of bead work among Native American women, in particular Kiowa artist Teri Greeves, and helps students to consider these works as both expressions of the individual artist and expressions of a cultural tradition.</p> <p>The collection includes work samples and resources, an interview with Ms. Greeves, demonstration video of how to make a Daisy Chain bracelet, and printable instructions.</p>

<p>Lei making is an important part of Hawaiian culture. These twisted strands are worn on important occasions and given as gifts of welcome. In this collection you'll find a demonstration video by Mokihana Scalph, as well as performances of children's stories, dance performances, and images of leis and ti leaves, to give context to the performances.</p>

<p>This collection comes from a family festival at the National Museum of the American Indian that explored uses of leather in Native communities - literally from the hunting and tanning of deer and their hides, to their use in ritual and everyday life. The collection includes demonstrations of deer-hide tanning, moccasin making, bead working, instructions to make a leather pouch and a daisy chain bracelet, and an interview and performance by Lawrence Baker and the White Oak Singers.</p>

<p>This collections comes from an American Indian Heritage Month family festival focusing on Tlingit culture from the northwest coast of America. Included here are music and dance performances by the Dakhka Kwaan Dancers, storytelling by Gene Tagaban, Shelly Laws, and Maria Williams (of her book, "How Raven Stole the Sun"), a moiety game, and hands-on demonstrations by Shelly Laws of how to weave a two-stranded basket and to make Tlingit-style beaded ear loops .</p>

<p>This collections comes from an Asian Pacific American Heritage Month family festival at the National Museum of Natural History. Included in the collection are interviews and demonstrations about dance with Dana Tai Soon Burgess, Japanese "kimekomi" doll making with Akiko Keene and Anne Cox, Thai fruit and vegetable carving with Phuangthong Malikul, Rangoli Indian design with Nisha Rajam and Anjana Mohanty, Korean calligraphy by Mookjae, and Chinese paper folding by Alice Li. </p>

<p>This collection comes from an Asian Pacific American Heritage Month family day at the Kogod Courtyard of the National Portrait Gallery. Included here are music and dance performances by the Chinese Youth Club Lion Dancers, Dhroopad, Mokihana Scalph, Sushmita Mazumdar, MHC's Fil-Am Heritage Dance Ensemble, and an interview with the 2014 Asian Pacific Islander American Spoken Word and Poetry Summit artists.</p>

<p>The videos shown here are from a series, hosted by the Smithsonian Office of Educational Technology and the Smithsonian Heritage Months Steering Committee, that features colleagues from around the country doing innovative work in the fields of community outreach and heritage. Featured here are colleagues from the Tenement Museum in New York City presenting, "Widening the Conversation: Involving Communities in Interpretive Planning," Martha Norkunas presenting "Listening Across Differences," and Faye McMahon and Benjamin Virgilio presenting, "Not Just Child's Play: Emerging Tradition and the Lost Boys of Sudan."</p>

<p>This topical collection explores the contributions to American history and society of Civil Rights activist Dolores Huerta, the "co-architect" with Cesar Chavez of the American Farm Workers Movement. The images and resources can be used as discussion or writing prompts in a variety of courses, including history, culture, language, and literature. Included in this collection are images from the exhibition, "One Life: Dolores Huerta," a bilingual video with National Portrait Gallery curator Taína Caragol, footage of an interview program with Dolores Huerta at the museum, and an NPR interview with Dolores Huerta in January 2017.</p> <p>#LatinoHAC #BecauseOfHerStory<br /></p>

<p>Joseph Stella (1877-1946) was an Italian born American Futurist painter. He is best known for his renditions of industrial America.</p><p>Included in this collection are some his works from the collections of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the National Portrait Gallery, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum, with oral history interviews from the Smithsonian Institution Library and the Smithsonian Archives of American Art. You can find other works by searching the collections. </p><p><br /></p>