Culture Day

Due to some scheduling confusion at my school I realized a couple of weeks ago that I had planned to give my quarter exam to my students a week before the equivalent of “finals week” here, and was left with an open class. So I said to myself, “why don’t you plan to always give your students their exam a week early and then you can take advantage of the extra weeks and give a cultural lesson instead”. So that is just what I did. I decided for my first “Culture Day” I would teach my students a bit of the country-western culture of the US and teach them a basic country line dance. I began by explaining genre of country, going over music, movies, fashion and food, and ultimately ending up with dance. After a 15 min lecture, we moved the tables and chairs to the sides of the classroom and I began teaching the students a simple country line dance. To the older kids I taught the Country Waltz because it is a partner dance and I thought they would be able to handle dancing with one another. I was wrong. The girls ran to one side of the room and the boys to the other and it was like pulling teeth to get them to dance with each other! Oh the days of middle school :) Well, finally I got them going and they picked it up pretty quickly. For my younger classes I taught the most basic Line Dance that I know, and it was hilarious to see them hopping around to upbeat country songs! Overall it was a success, although I decided for my next culture day I will be bringing Meredith with me to help maintain order! I’m not sure where to go from here – so if you all have any “Culture Day” ideas, let me know!
I’ve posted a few videos below of my classes presenting the dances they learned – hope you enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkTGkOP2TNE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Fw_rn1TQrs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C6GFRe-48xU