September 2009
Hispanic Heritage Month
Hispanic Heritage Month celebrates the diverse history and important contributions Latinos have made to American culture. Learn more with these Verizon Thinkfinity selections.
Latino Poetry Blog: Blogging as a Forum for Open Discussion
ReadWriteThink
Use critical thinking skills, as well as the act of blogging, to analyze peers' poetry.
Hispanic American Stories: Sandra Cisneros, Jaime Escalante and Cesar Chavez
Thinkfinity Literacy Network
Stories, audio recordings and related activities about three Hispanic Americans who have helped shape U.S. history.
Bittersweet Harvest: The Bracero Program, 1942 - 1964
Smithsonian's History Explorer
The bracero program, a little-known chapter of American and Mexican history, was originally created to fill the labor shortages of World War II. Both bitter and sweet, the bracero experience tells a story of exploitation but also of opportunity.
Bracero History Archive
Smithsonian's History Explorer
Discover the oral histories and artifacts that define the Bracero program.
Mission Nuestra Señora de la Concepción and the Spanish Mission in the New World.
EDSITEment
Visit a New World Spanish mission and discover the purposes of mission life and the meaning of mission architecture at the nation's oldest unreconstructed Spanish mission!"
EDSITEment's National Hispanic Heritage Month Feature
EDSITEment
Learn more about Hispanic heritage by visiting the humanities lesson plans and Web sites gathered in this feature.
Esperanza Rising: Not Being Afraid to Start Over
EDSITEment
In this lesson students look behind the story Esperanza Rising at the historical, social, and cultural circumstances that help account for the great contrasts and contradictions that Esperanza experiences when she moves to California.
ReadWriteThink's Hispanic Heritage Month Feature
Students research topics related to Hispanic culture, including culture and accomplishments of Hispanic people.
The Music & Meaning of Mexican Corridos
ARTSEDGE
Students examine the historical and cultural significance of Mexican ballads known as corridos.
The Life and Music of Celia Cruz
Smithsonian's History Explorer
Explore the life of Celia Cruz, an influential and legendary musical figure both in her native country of Cuba, and the United States, her adopted country. Students will connect her life to a variety of subjects including immigration, history, geography, music theory, music history, and art.
My Family Traditions: A Class Book and a Potluck Lunch
ReadWriteThink
After reading Family Pictures/Cuadros de Familia by Carmen Lomas Garza, students describe the book's pictures and discuss family traditions. They then create a class book, which includes artwork, information about their ancestral countries, descriptions of their own family traditions and family recipes. Finally, students share both a special food and the class book with their families and peers at a potluck lunch.
La Familia
EDSITEment
Learn about families in various Spanish cultures and gain a preliminary knowledge of the Spanish language by learning the Spanish names for various family members.
A Vision of Puerto Rico: The Teodoro Vidal Collection
Smithsonian's History Explorer
Explore the history of Puerto Rico through the eyes of Teodoro Vidal, a man who captured the island's history with the many objects he collected.
Using Timeline Games and Mexican History to Improve Comprehension
ReadWriteThink
Students study the basic elements of Mexican history and use online resources to gather the information they need to make an illustrated timeline.
Grade: 3 | 4 | 5
Five Artists of the Mexican Revolution
ARTSEDGE
Students research the major events and personalities in the Mexican Revolution, and explore how these people and events influenced the art being created at that time in Mexico.
Grade: 9 | 10 | 11 | 12
Investigating Names to Explore Personal History and Cultural Traditions
ReadWriteThink
Students investigate the meanings and origins of their own names in order to establish their own personal histories and to explore the cultural significance of naming traditions, using a passage from Sandra Cisneros' The House on Mango Street as a model.
Author and Poet Mat Mora
ReadWriteThink
Learn about extended metaphore poems using Pat Mora's book The Desert is My Mother/El Desierto Es Mi Madre.
Author Gabriel García Márquez
ReadWriteThink
This resource about author Gabriel García Márquez includes a classroom activity in which students explore magical realism through reading, story telling and drawing. Links to related lesson plans and Web resources, along with a list of related texts, are also found here.
Corridos Multimedia Presentation
ARTSEDGE
This Look-Listen-Learn feature focuses on the traditional Mexican ballad form, the corrido. The multimedia presentation features several corridos, including audio clips and written lyrics in English and Spanish.
Guantanamera: A Poem and a Song
ARTSEDGE
In this lesson students listen to "Guantanamera," a Cuban folk song made famous by Pete Seeger with lyrics from a poem by Jose Marti. They discover that these two men shared more than a song.
Maps
XPEDITIONS
Help students understand the location of Spanish-speaking countries with maps from the Xpeditions Atlas. Users can choose basic or detailed views of the maps, turn borders on or off, and save maps as a .pdf or .gif file.