IGH Middle School International Club

April 7th Meeting

2010-04-07T19:29:00.000-07:00

15 Students attended today's meeting. Our Agenda included getting t-shirt order forms out, starting planning for an international movie night, finishing our dream catchers and working on cultural research projects.

March 24th Meeting

2010-03-25T19:36:00.000-07:00

19 students attended our meeting this week. We wrapped up our H20 walk for life service learning project. Did the initial glue work for our dream catchers wrapped up our time working on our North American cultural research project.

H2O for Life Walk is a Success

2010-03-22T19:11:00.000-07:00

Over 30 students took part in the H2O Walk for Life today. We walked to raise awareness and money to help a school in Guatemala improve access to clean water. The students hiked 6km carrying 6 liters of water to gain empathy for children around the world who must make such treks daily to provide water for their families.

The students did an outstanding job today. They helped others, challenged themselves and represented well for our schools. One woman not involved in the walk summed it up when she came over to the kids and said, "I think your wonderful."

This was a combined effort of the Middle School International Club, High School International Club and High School Spanish Club.

Here are various images of the day. Note the smiles.

March 17th Meeting

2010-03-21T19:44:00.000-07:00

18 students had a busy meeting finalizing our H20 walk for life plan. We viewed a slide show about the school in Guatemala and answered many student questions. We're excited to work with the High School International Club and Spanish club on this project.

Starting our dream catcher project was the next order of business. We read the Dakota story of the dream catchers origins. One interesting point was that the webbing in the Dakota story caught the good letting the bad pass through. Ms. Hallin shared that in the Ojibwa version the webbing catches the bad and lets the good go through. We were interested to see that culturally the same object was viewed differently.

Our snacks for the day came from Mexico. We had cookies, pumpkin seeds and salty, spicy tamarind fruit snacks.

Our final activity was to move forward on our cultures of North America project.

March 10th Meeting

2010-03-12T12:47:00.000-08:00

21 students and Ms. Collopy, one of our Geography teachers, attended our meeting this week. Our first order of business was to pass out pledge sheet for our H2O Walk for Life event comming up on March 22nd. We are teaming with the High School International Club to raise both funds and awareness around access to clean water. The funds we raise will go to support the Guatemalan school pictured below.

Next we agreed on a design for our club T-Shirt. It will be a blue shirt printed with a green Earth map. The top of the shirt will say IGH International Club. "We are the World" will be printed under the map. Students will use puff paint to mark places on the globe that they have connections to.

At snack time the students enjoyed a Somali cake and cookies from Italy. The leaders were impressed that the students could predict that an African store would sell Italian cookies because of past colonialism.

Our final activity engaged the students in a dialog about race. Students learned that humans come in a continuum of colors instead of black, red, yellow and white. We also introduced the concept of race as a social construct.

Our next meeting will be March 17th. Our goal is to finalize our h2O for life plans, start T-shirt orders and work on our North American cultures research starting with a dream catcher making activity. See you there.

March 10th Meetings Agenda.

2010-03-08T13:03:00.000-08:00

We have another exciting day planned. First, we will work to finalize our involvement in H2o for Life. Our event day for this is March 22nd. Second, we will be coming up with our club t-shirt design for the year. Later, we will be doing a hand painting activity that looks at race. We will also be working on our North American culture project. And, snacks, did I mention snacks will be of international origin.

We hope to see everyone there. New students are welcome too!

Show Me The Money

2010-02-25T18:59:00.000-08:00

In the picture above 19 students are showing off actual paper currency from around the the world. Student introduced themselves and shared the country of origin for their money. We briefly identified where each country was on Earth.

Once this was done we had a conversation about teaming with the High School International Club to participate in their H2O for Life Campaign. The goal of this project would be to raise awareness and funds for clean water around the world. Students will walk 6km carrying 6L of water to mimic the daily water gathering chores of many children around the world. The kids decided unanimously to take part in this project.

Next we reviewed some of our key vocabulary, ethnicity, culture and social Justice

The students then participated in an activity where they looked at different characteristics of people to decide if these characteristics put them in an "up" or "down" group. "Up" groups receive privilege for this characteristics where "down" groups either see no privileged or feel oppression. For example males would be an "up" group while females would be a "down" group. The students did a wonderful job.

After snack, the students started a continuing project of exploring culture around the world. First we will focus on the many cultures in North America.

Our next meeting will be on March 10th. Both Mr. Anderson and Ms. Hallin are off campus at meetings on March 3rd.

Another great meeting!

2-17 Second Meeting Was Fun

2010-02-17T15:56:00.001-08:00

Great turn out. 23 students attended our club meeting today. We started the meeting with introductions. We also reviewed the clubs purpose in an ever shrinking world. Next we discussed three vocabulary items, social justice, ethnicity and race.

Our snacks for the day were Chinese Cookies and coconut in honor of the new Year of the Tiger.

Here students are marking their historic ethnicity on a map of the world. We also brainstormed how we would promote ethnic pride in our school. The picture below is of the the whole group of students.

We promised the kids we would do a silly picture as a way of getting them to sit still in the picture above.

Feb. 10, 2010 First Meeting of the School year.

2010-02-10T15:59:00.000-08:00

We had a great first meeting of the year today. Eight students participated in a mapping activity where each individual identified countries that they were connected to ethnically or culturally. Our group connected to 36 points on the map, illustrating the importance of developing intercultural skills.

In the activity pictured below we explored the distribution of wealth in the United States. Each student represented 10% of the nations population and each chair equaled 10% of the nations wealth. We learned that the most wealthy student (10%) had 7 chairs to sit in while the other 9 students (90%) needed to share the remaining 3 chairs. We concluded the activity with a discussion about why some have more than others. Did the students think it was fair?

Here we are on the computers teaching the students to access our blog.

The last picture is of the students being goofy. Who wins the funny face contest?

Year End T-Shirts

2009-06-04T11:26:00.001-07:00

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In what turned out to be our greatest work in diplomacy, (see previous posting) we have our T-Shirt order in. Here are two sixth grade students showing off the final product of our work.

A closer look shows the arms of Earth reaching out to four faces.

A lesson in democracy, leadership and communication skills

2009-05-27T14:22:00.000-07:00

Twenty-one students participated in a sometimes heated debate on the color scheme for our T-Shirts. While our intended plan was to have students do a series of team building activities after a quick discussion on shirt orders, we spent over an hour working out a satisfactory agreement.

Taking advantage of a teachable event, taking turns, listening to others' opinions, speaking respectfully, compromising and being assertive were all part of today's learning. We made comparisons to the legislative process and to the failure of our state leadership to come to a budget agreement.

The T-Shirt order means a lot to the students. They worked hard through the frustration to come to an agreement.

We also decided to postpone the Mississippi clean-up picnic until later in the summer or next fall, as we are running out of school year.

May 4 Meeting

2009-05-06T06:11:00.000-07:00

One of our activities this meeting was to have student create and vote on a design for a club T-Shirt. This was the favorite.

Another activity involved adding to our bulletin board and creating an analogy between people of the world and money of the world. Click on the pictures to make them larger for easier reading.

We also talked about our year end river clean-up/ picnic. We are asking the High School club to participate with us. Were hoping a combined activity will transition our 8th grade members to the high school club.

10 students participated in these activities.

NOCHE DE CINE

2009-03-14T20:43:00.000-07:00

41 people attended our Spanish Movie night. The audience had a mix of elementary students, high school students, middle school students, parents and at least one grandparent.

The International Club students did a great job planning, helping set-up and serving popcorn and drinks.

Spanish Language Movie Night Friday March 13th.

2009-03-08T19:22:00.000-07:00

The MS International Club, in conjunction with the Elementary and Simley Spanish Clubs will be hosting a Spanish language movie night at the MS Library from 6:30 to 8:30 pm. Popcorn and will be provided.

We welcome students to bring their families and especially their younger siblings to the night of family fun.

Working on the Bulletin Board

2009-03-05T15:28:00.000-08:00

A group of students stayed after school to design and put up our club bulletin board. They did a great job.

March 3rd Meeting American Dream

2009-03-03T19:12:00.000-08:00

Today 19 students played a game called American Dream. They learned that their are multiple factors in life that privilege some while others have a harder time of being successful. The purpose of this game/activity was to introduce students to social justice. I was impressed with the kids understanding and thoughtfulness.

We also set a time date and place for our Spanish language movie night, Friday, March 13th in the Middle School IMC. The elementary and Simley Spanish clubs will be invited as well. The students decided we should watch Madagascar II.

Two small groups will work on a bulletin board and fliers for the movie. Students also expressed interest in designing and ordering a T-shirt for the club.

Our nest meeting will be for the Movie on March 13th.

First Meeting Sucess/Meeting Schedule.

2009-02-17T15:10:00.000-08:00

Serious picture

Silly picture

22 students attended our first International Club meeting. They came with good ideas and positive attitudes. Our agenda went as follows:
Explanation of the Club
Introductions including name, grade, and origin of ancestry
Milk and Cookies
Look at the Blog
Discussion of first activity.
Brief discussion of Social Justice
Setting Meeting Times and dates.

We decided that we will have a weekly meeting on Tuesday mornings from 7:05 to 7:20. We will also have bi-monthly after school meetings alternating between Tuesdays and Fridays.

Our next morning meeting will be at 7:05 on Tuesday, Feb. 24. Our next after school meeting will be on Tuesday March 3 at 2:35. Treats provided.

First Meeting Feb. 17th @ 2:35

2009-02-12T05:59:00.000-08:00

欢迎,Willkommen, 환영, Добро пожаловать, Benvenuto, Welkom, Υποδοχή The newly formed Inver Grove Heights Middle School International Club is seeking members.

We will have our first organizational meeting on Feb. 17th at 2:35. Treats will be provided. Our agenda for the meeting will be to explain the club, find areas of student interest and to prepare for our first club activity.

An activity bus will be available to take students home at 4:05, so transportation is taken care off. Students will be supervised until the bus leaves.

If there are questions students please see Mr. Anderson in 8215. Parents please email andersoh@invergrove.k12.mn.us.

Inver Grove Heights Middle School International Club

2009-02-08T07:05:00.000-08:00

The Inver Grove Heights Middle School International Club is an organization committed to the understanding and appreciation of diverse cultural heritages on an individual, school, community and world level. Our goal is to explore our own cultural heritage while we investigate the heritage of others to bolster connection, improve understanding and increase social justice.

The intent of the organization is to be educational, philanthropic and interesting to its members. Activities would be decided on by the group. I anticipate interacting with various presenters, looking at the arts, playing games, watching movies, learning about other languages, participating in social justice learning activities, service learning and learning about all aspects of culture.

The Inver Grove Heights Middle School International Club is open to all students interested in our goals and activities. Fitting with these goals we would like to encourage membership amongst students who are under represented in other school activities.