Maddison Crowther, Brittany Lowry, Sammi Turchet, Jessica Woollings

Subjects /Strands: Social Studies - Heritage and Identity: Changing Family and Community Traditions
Unit Title: ---Celebrating Heritage and the Diversity of Traditions
Grade: Two
Number of days: 10 days (2 weeks)
Keywords: Origin, History, Culture, Diversity, Traditions, Celebrations, Nationality, Ancestors
Stage 1 – Identify Desired Results
Established Goals (Curricular Expectations):
Social Studies
A1. Application: compare some significant traditions and celebrations among diverse groups and
at different times, and identify some of the reasons for changes in these traditions/celebrations
(FOCUS ON: Perspective; Cause and Consequence)
● A1.2 compare their family’s structure and some of their traditions and celebrations with
those of their peers’ families (e.g., traditions/celebrations related to rites of passage,
holidays, foods)
A2. Inquiry: use the social studies inquiry process to investigate some of the past and present
traditions and celebrations within their own family and the communities to which they belong
(FOCUS ON: Continuity and Change)
● A2.1 formulate questions to guide investigations into some the past and present traditions
and celebrations in their own and the communities in which they belong (e.g., simple
questions related to past and present practices associated with Christmas, Yom Kippur, Eid
ul-Fitr, Diwali, or Kwanzaa)
● A2.2 gather and organize information on some of the past and present traditions and
celebrations within their family and the community to which they belong, using primary
and/or secondary sources that they have gathered themselves or that have been provided
to them (e.g., photo albums, family stories, interviews, artifacts, newspaper clippings,
paintings, Elders’ stories)
● A2.6 communicate the results of their inquiries, using appropriate vocabulary (e.g., holiday,
tradition, culture, celebrations, generations) and formats (e.g., a big book cooperatively
produced by the class using photographs uploaded from digital cameras; a recording of
stories about how celebrations have changed and stayed the same in their family;
interpretive movements representing a variety of celebrations)

A3. Understanding Context: Describe some of the major groups in their community, including
different types of families, and some of the ways in which traditions and heritage are passed on
by such groups (FOCUS ON: Interrelationships; Significance)
● A3.1 identify and describe different types of families (e.g., families with one parent, two
parents, no children; same-sex families; blended and multigenerational families; immigrant
families; families where the parents come from different religious or ethnocultural groups)
● A3.4 describe some significant traditions and celebrations of their families, their peers, and
 their own communities, as well as of some other communities in Canada ( e.g., fall fairs,
faith holidays, Remembrance Day, Canada Day, Earth Dat etc.) Sample questions: What are
some of the big celebrations in your family during the year?

Language Arts
Oral Communication
Overall Expectations
1. listen in order to understand and respond appropriately in a variety of situations for a variety of
purposes
2. use speaking skills and strategies appropriately to communicate with different audiences for a
variety of purposes
Specific Expectations
● Purpose 1.1 identify purposes for listening in a variety of situations, formal and informal,
and set personal goals for listening, initially with support and direction (e.g., to acquire
information from a presentation by a guest speaker; to exchange ideas in a small-group
discussion; to enjoy and understand poetry)
● Extending Understanding 1.6 extend understanding of oral texts by connecting the ideas in
them to their own knowledge and experience; to other familiar texts, including print and
visual texts; and to the world around them (e.g., talk about their own ideas and
experiences related to the topic before listening; connect ideas from oral presentations to
related school and community events and/or to other texts with similar topics or themes,
including multicultural texts or texts in their own first language)
● Presentation Strategies 1.9 identify some of the presentation strategies used in oral texts
and explain how they influence the audience (e.g., the use of facial expressions helps the
listener understand what is being said)
● Vocal Skills and Strategies 2.5 identify some vocal effects, including tone, pace, pitch, and
volume, and use them appropriately, and with sensitivity towards cultural differences, to
help communicate their meaning (e.g., adjust the volume to suit the purpose for speaking
and the size and type of audience)
Writing
Overall Expectations
1. Generate, gather, and organize ideas and information to write for an intended purpose and
audience
Specific Expectation
● Research 1.3 gather information to support ideas for writing in a variety of ways and/or
from a variety of sources (e.g., from discussions with family and friends; from a variety of
texts, including teacher read aloud, mentor texts, shared-, guided-, and independent-
reading texts, and media texts)
● Point of View 2.5 identify, initially with support and direction, their point of view and one
or more possible different points of view about the topic
Media Literacy
Overall Expectation
3. create a variety of media texts for different purposes and audiences, using appropriate forms,
conventions, and techniques
Specific Expectation
● Purpose and Audience 3.1 identify the topic, purpose, and audience for media texts they
plan to create (e.g., an advertisement to interest both boys and girls in buying an action
toy)
● Producing Media Texts 3.4 produce media texts for specific purposes and audiences, using
a few simple media forms and appropriate conventions and techniques
●
Math
Data Management and Probability
● Demonstrate an ability to organize objects into categories, by sorting and classifying
objects using two attributes simultaneously.
● Gather data to answer a question, using a simple survey with a limited number of
responses.
● Collect and organize primary data (e.g., data collected by the class) that is categorical or
discrete (i.e. that can be counted such as the number of students absent), and display the
data using one-to-one correspondence in concrete graphics, pictographs, line plots, simple
bar graphs, and other graphic organizers (e.g., tally charts, diagrams), with appropriate
titles and labels and with labels ordered appropriately along horizontal axes, as needed.

Art
B1. Creating and Presenting: apply the creative process to dramatic play and process drama,
using the elements and conventions of drama to communicate feelings, ideas, and stories
● B1.3 plan and shape the direction of a dramatic play or role play, building on their own and
others’ ideas both in and out of role, with support (e.g., In role: respond to a scientist
[roleplayed by the teacher] who says the class must give up their pet dinosaur because it
poses a safety hazard; Out of role: use conventions such as discussion and/or guided
imagery to establish the setting)
D1. Creating and Presenting: apply the creative process to produce a variety of two- and three-
dimensional artworks, using elements, principles, and techniques of visual arts to communicate
feelings, ideas, and understandings
● D1.1 create two- and three-dimensional works of art that express feelings and ideas
inspired by activities in their community or observations of nature (e.g., a streetscape
collage with children playing, made with paint, pastel, and various kinds of paper
[newspaper, magazines]; small glue-line prints in which a variety of curvy and pointy lines
show illusory texture or represent a pattern they have seen on insects in the schoolyard or
garden)
D3. Exploring Forms and Cultural Contexts: demonstrate an understanding of a variety of art
forms, styles, and techniques from the past and present, and their social and/or community
 contexts.
● D3.1 identify and describe a variety of visual art forms they see in their home, at school, in
their community, and in visual arts experiences (e.g., design of everyday items; picture
books; artists-in-education; community artworks, such as public sculpture, architecture,
and murals; Aboriginal designs in dancing regalia; artworks in student art exhibitions and
community art festivals)
● D3.2 demonstrate an awareness of a variety of works of art and artistic traditions from
diverse communities, times, and places (e.g., depictions of nature, of people doing things
together, or of people at work; miniature paintings from India; Aboriginal textiles, ceramics,
and petroglyphs; contemporary Inuit drawings of life in the North by Annie Pootoogook)

What essential questions will be considered? What understandings are desired? *framing
questions*
What is a family? Students will understand...
What is a tradition? ● Students will understand the
How are traditions different from student to importance of family and what family
student? means to them.
How are traditions created? ● Students will understand what a
How do we celebrate in our school on a daily tradition is, and how they differ from
basis? family to family.
Do we all celebrate the same traditions? ● Students will understand that not
everyone in the community celebrates
the same traditions

What key knowledge and skills will students acquire as a result of this unit? *learning goals*

Students will know… Students will understand…

1. There are a variety of different
families and groups within their
communities
2. How to ask and answer questions
about traditions and celebrations.
3. That every family is different,
however, we still belong to the same
community.
1. Past and present traditions and
celebrations within their own family
and the communities to which they
belong to
2. Students will understand the
differences between family traditions
and celebrations among groups.

Stage 2 – Determine Acceptable Evidence

What evidence will show that students understand? *Culminating Tasks/Success Criteria*
Performance Tasks:
1. What is your Thanksgiving Tradition? - Using mentor text “Fangsgiving”, in pairs
 students will create a Venn diagram about what they ate at Thanksgiving, and then
share what they learned to the class
2. Family Tree - Students will refer back to the template of their family tree to create a
visual of a family tree
3. Responding About Your Traditions and Culture - Students will be referring back to the
video shown in lesson one and responding to it. They will answer a question on what
they learned in this unit and will create a response question to the students

What student products and performances will provide evidence of desired understandings?
Final Culminating Task (Responding About Your Traditions and Culture )
Comparing our class Thanksgiving
Family Tree

By what criteria will student products and performances be evaluated? *Assessment tools
and criteria*
The Achievement Chart What is your Thanksgiving tradition?- student
Teacher Observations checklist - can they identify differences they
Final Assessment Rubric (Assessment of observed
Learning) Family Tree- Checklist - can students use the
template to make an appealing family tree, have they
identified more than one person on their family tree
Responding About Your Traditions and
Culture - Rubric

Ask students what they learned, what they

Self Assessment liked and written/oral feedback for next time
Any questions left unanswered

Stage 3 – Plan Learning Experiences

Week at a Glance
Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday
Week
1 Lesson One: Lesson Two: Lesson Three: Lesson Four: Lesson Five:
Classroom and Families Are All Where Did My My Family Tree Family in a Tree
School Traditions Different Family Come
From?

Week
2 Lesson Six: Lesson Seven: Lesson Eight: Lesson Nine: Lesson Ten:
What is your Comparing Our Representing What Are Your What Are Your
Thanksgiving Classes traditions in the Traditions and Traditions and
tradition? Thanksgiving winter plasticine Culture? Culture?
tree ornament
Lesson Lesson Name Language Arts Math Arts

1 Classroom and Writing- 1.3

School Oral Comm- 1.1
Traditions

2 Families Are All Writing-1.3, 2.5

Different

3 Where Did My Writing-1.3, 2.5

Family Come
From?

4 My Family Tree Exploring Forms and

Cultural Contexts-
D3.1, D3.4

5 Family in a Tree Exploring Forms and

Cultural Contexts-
D3.1, D3.4

6 What is your Oral Comm- 1.1 Specific Expectation:

Thanksgiving Writing- 1.3, 2.5 Demonstrate an in
tradition? order to organize
objects into
categories, by
sorting and
classifying objects
using two or more
attributes

7 Comparing Our Specific Expectation:

Classes Collection and
Thanksgiving Organization of Data

8 Representing Creating and

traditions in the Presenting- D1.1
winter plasticine
tree ornament

9 What Are Your Oral Comm- 1.1, 1.6 Exploring Forms and
Traditions and 1.9, 2.5 Cultural Contexts- D3.2
 Culture? Final Media Literacy- 3.1,
Assessment 3.4

10 What Are Your Oral Comm- 1.1, 1.6 Exploring Forms and
Traditions and 1.9, 2.5 Cultural Contexts- D3.2
Culture? Final Media Literacy- 3.1,
Assessment
3.4

Lesson Notes Resources

1: Classroom and School Introduce the topic of traditions and community by Computer &
Traditions asking the following questions: Projector
● What are some things we always do in our Journals
classroom (birthdays, story time, o Canada) Pencil
● What are some things we always do at our
school (pizza day, play day, Christmas concert)
● Why would you feel if we didn't do these
things anymore? Why?
● What are some things you do with your
family?

Watch the video from Windsor that a class created

about the different Cultures and Traditions in their
class. After watching the video, the teacher will invite
the students to share some of the questions the
children asked in the video. Then, the students will
write in their journal notebooks to answer some of
the questions the kids asked in the video (How do you
celebrate your birthday? Do you play a sport? Do you play
an instrument? What type of music do you listen to? Do
you have any cultural traditions?)
● In your journals, respond to the questions
they posed in the video (quick one-word
answer or a picture).
● These will be collected at the end of class to
be reviewed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8nh6qIh-_A

2: Families Are All Different
Pose the question to the students about what family Journals
means to them and who makes up their family? Pencil
Watch the video: Families are all different Paper
● After watching the video, as a class, we will
make a mind map of the different types of
families there are/who makes up a family

3: Where Did My Family Come
From?
4: My Family Tree
● If students are having a difficult time I may
offer some ideas (adoptive families, foster
families, single-parent families, an only child,
etc.)
● After we have discussed different types of
families, students will be asked to go to their
journals. In here they will be asked to write
about their family. They will identify who is in
their family, what is important to them about
their family and what they like to do with
their family
● After writing, they will bring their writing to
me, so I can edit their sentences. They will
then be asked to get a piece of paper and
draw their family. Once their drawing is
complete they will get a piece of lined paper
to write their edited sentences
● Their sentences about their family will be
stapled to the bottom of their picture so they
can be hung in the class to identify all the
different types of families there are in our
classroom.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udlY_kvnPJA
MINDS ON: Read students book called “Me and My “Me and My
Family Tree” by: Joan Sweeney Family Tree”
● Ask students how their families came Paper
Pencil
together
● Create a list of questions for someone in your
family that you want to “interview”
● Things students may ask: how old the family
member is, their favourite memory
● Students will then bring this information back
to share it with the class
Moving on from what we talked about yesterday Chart Paper
“where did my family come from?” we are going to Markers
learn how to create a family tree. Computer &
Projector
● Show the video about family and how to
Template
create a family tree. Pencil
● On chart paper create an example of a family

5: Family in a Tree
6: What is your Thanksgiving
tradition?
tree of the teachers family (mother, father,
teacher, husband, husbands parents, kids…
etc.) Highlight key points on the chart for the
students to refer back to.
● Students will be given a template to draft
their family tree before completing the good
copy during the next lesson.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHaObkHEkHQ
Scissors
● Students will have already been asked to Construction
bring in pictures of their family members that Paper
Glue
they identified in lesson three.
Pencil Crayons
● The teacher will have photocopied the Crayons
pictures brought in so the originals can go Markers
back home
● Students will be asked to create a tree about
their family
● They will be given a choice of a photocopied
tree and will be asked to colour it
● Following the colouring they will cut the
photocopied pictures of their family members
and glue them onto the tree
● This will help symbolize the diversity of the
families in our classroom.
● Students will use the pictures they brought
from home to create a family tree. Using the
template and construction paper.
We have been talking a lot about family - Can Chart Paper
someone tell me what family means to them? Markers
Fangsgiving -
● We are now going to learn about a Book
tradition - Can anyone take a guess at Paper
what a tradition is? Pencil
● Create a list on a piece of chart paper of
what students say (if they are stumped,
you can throw out some ideas - things
that are past down, things we celebrate,
traditions things we do on
● holidays)
 ● Read the book “Fangsgiving”
● Ask if anyone was able to notice anything
about traditions/families
● Ask if anyone noticed anything different
about when they celebrated Thanksgiving
● Students will then be told: Working with
your elbow partner you are going to
create a Venn Diagram comparing your
Thanksgiving traditions to theirs - Things
you may consider to discuss
○ If they celebrate - if not what do
they do on that day
○ What they ate at their dinner
○ Who was at their dinner
○ What the weather was like
○ How many people attended
● As a reflection students can be asked:
○ What did you learn from your
partner?
○ Did you find any similarities?
○ Did you find any differences?
○ How did this activity make you feel

7: Comparing Our Classes Students will sit on the carpet in front of the chart Chart Paper
Thanksgiving paper. Markers
After discussing our Thanksgiving yesterday, today we
are going to compare what our entire class ate at
Thanksgiving.
● We are going to be making a tally chart on the
different foods we ate.
● Can anyone tell me some of the foods you ate
at Thanksgiving or a food you learned
someone else ate (ham, turkey, roast beef,
potatoes, stuffing, salad, bread, pie, ice
cream, other)
● Wonderful, now that we have a list of ten
items, we are going to vote on what we ate
● Raise your hand if you ate ham at
Thanksgiving, raise your hand if you ate
turkey, raise your hand ...etc.
● Now that we have all voted and we have a
nice tally chart in front of us, we are going to
make a bar graph of this information

8: Representing traditions in
the winter plasticine tree
ornament
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uPONBdkVJ0
9: What Are Your Traditions
and Culture? Final Assessment
● Remember our graph always needs to have a
title … What are we comparing in our graph
again? Student “Different foods we eat
Thanksgiving”
● Now that we have our title, what are our titles
along the X axis (different foods), and the
number of students in the class up the Y axis.
● Example: 10 people ate ham, you will draw a
line up to 10 and colour in the bar.
● Students will listen to the read aloud by Computer &
Robert Munsch “So Much Snow.” While they Projector
are watching the read aloud on youtube, Chart Paper
students will be generating ideas and Markers
reflecting on winter traditions they do, for Robert Munsch
example, making snowmen, sleigh rides, “So Much Snow”
snowball fight, drinking hot chocolate...etc. Tin Foil
● Teacher will create a web map on the board Plasticine
inviting students to share some traditions Ribbon
they participate in during the winter months Hole Punch
in Canada.
● After the class discussion, students will create
a plasticine representation of their favourite
tradition in mini tin foil tart dishes and create
a tree ornament for Christmas.
● Teacher will re-show the video from the first Chart Paper
lesson, about the traditions and cultures in Makers
the class from Windsor. Journals
● Although we have already answered these Pencils
questions in our journals, we are going to
discuss certain questions that stood out to
them, and how they might answer the
question. The teacher will explain that
together as a class we are going to create a
video response to the class from Windsor,
each student is responsible for responding to
two questions that we asked in the video.
● Using our knowledge from language, we are
going to make a list of questions that are
different from the original questions. Does
anyone have any ideas of questions we could
ask them?
○ Favourite thing to do in your community?
○ What’s your family's favourite meal?
○ What’s your favourite holiday?
○ What’s your favourite thing we do at

10: What Are Your Traditions
and Culture? Final Assessment
school?
○ Favourite thing to do at Christmas?
● Each student will respond to one of our
questions that we are posing them, just as
they did for us. Raise your hand for question
one, for question two… etc.
● Working Individually:
○ Script out your responses to the
original questions and the new
questions, use as much description as
possible, ensure you are using clear
and concise writing practices.
○ Draw a picture to represent your
response. For example, my favourite
sport is hockey, and shows a picture
that they drew of them playing
hockey.
● Next day, we are going to be reviewing our
script and filming our video. Come prepared
to speak clear and proud.
● Teacher will check in with students about Filming
their responses and drawings for the video, by Equipment
now they should be doing the final touches on Journals
scripts and visuals. Students will rehearse
their script before filming.
● We have a grade eight student helping with
the filming, we are going to be filming around
the school with a group of students and the
grade eight student will organize the filming
and ensure the students are on task and
creating good content.
● One student will answer the question, for
example, “What’s your family’s favourite
meal?” The student responds “Spaghetti, my
family is from Italy” while showing a picture of
the spaghetti that they drew in their journal
● There will be time allotted for self-
assessment.