Miranda Springer

Dr. Flowers
EDU 280
8 April 2013
Cultural Activities
I would teach discrimination for the first assignment. By doing this it will get the students
to challenge their own thoughts and views of discrimination when faced with it themselves. By
forcing discrimination on students, it would make them understand that mistreating people
because they are different is unacceptable behavior in society and especially in a school setting.
I would teach the students by dividing the class into thirds. By identifying them into
different groups with a green, purple, and orange baseball caps and sweat bands. The baseball
caps will identify the obvious differences between students. The sweat bands represent the
underlying differences that people discriminate against. I will lay out ground rules; not
interaction between colors for the rest of the week, record daily behaviors and feeling, and I will
have other students watching to ensure that the exercise in being performed. As a psychological
exercise, having students observe and participating within the exercise is more for older students.
If this is applied to younger ones, I would not need student observers. With older students being
watched, they will behave more as a group rather than individually because of their fear of being
an outcast.
At the end of the week, I will have the observers report the behavior of the other students.
I will also collect the journal entries, caps, and sweat bands for the week from the students. As
the final class activity, I will have the students reflect as a group the implications, feelings, and
thoughts that discrimination inflicts on a society. As a possible result of the exercise, students

will think before they act on false assumptions about other people because they would now be
sympathetic if discriminated against.
The second activity I would have the kids preform is a cultural assimilation exercise. The
point of the exercise would be to further understand the effects of being mistreated based on
prejudices. When students are exposed to the effect of assimilation toward multicultural people
in society and multicultural students in school settings, they learn to understand and appreciate
their culture and the culture of others when they are not forced into assimilation.
For the exercise, I would have the children research their pasts and choose a culture of
their heritage. Once the students have a full understanding of their chosen heritage, they will
genuinely identify with the culture and have sincere emotions toward the exercise. Since
emotions are the key to understanding, having a controlled environment that will be a place of
understanding and sympathy so that change can take place.
The simulation will commence in a manner that one cultural group will be in control of a
system that another culture will be a part of. For example, the Native Americans can be in
control of a Six Flags location. They will have the final say as to dress code, rides, customer
service, employment, and the like. Then after a few days of student interaction, the roles will
change to the other culture being in control. Each day the students will record the events,
emotions, and possible solutions to the conflicts that arise. At the end of the simulation, we will
reflect and discuss as a group why cultural assimilation is not cultural pluralism and how we can
be more accepting and understanding to multiple cultures in a country where they are abundant.