Social Studies in the New Year

I love the new year. I get excited to re-evaluate and get rejuvenated with our curriculum. As I was looking at what we wanted to dive into in January, I found a book I just HAVE to have -homeschool moms know about the book obsession ;) I began a outline for a lesson using it. The book is:

One review summarizes it this way:

Hungry Planet: What The World Eats" by Peter Menzel and Faith D'Aluisio grabs your attention for the startlingly varied stories it tells about how people feed themselves in 24 countries around the world. Its contents are based on detailed research, beautifully photographed, presented with often disturbing clarity. We are introduced to 30 families, representing every continent, each family photographed with the food they had for the week they were interviewed. The household range is from the most affluent in the developed countries to the most awesome. "A rich and thoughtful commentary on today's human condition."

We will use this book to

1. Examine the importance of food in our lives by using a cool lesson plan I found on www.homeschoolingabout.com called Make a Meal of It!

2. Study different cultures and what they eat and how they obtain their food.

To really dive into number one, we will start by discussing where food comes from. We are going to go shopping and get various foods.

Then we will talk about the global diversity of the origins of our food. I have a worksheet I printed from the site mentioned above to classify where the food came from, how it was packaged, the name of the food and the price.

Lastly, we will talk about hunger and poverty, what we can do to help; and donate these foods to a food bank when we are finished.

I would love to take the children to serve in a soup kitchen. I think this would be a wonderful humbling activity for our whole family. It is great to serve together and show the children how important food can be for people.

For number two, my favorite part!-a field trip to the Farmer's Market and Central Market to examine the varieties of foods and gather some things for cooking up some multicultural foods!

I found the coolest multicultural food books on Amazon. They are board books, but have awesome illustrations and simple engaging text. Here's the Listmania List. The author covers Japanese, Chinese, Italian, Mexican and even Southern (let's not lie-it's the best!) foods.

I am so excited to really get into this lesson and I think the kids will love it! Not to mention food is on my top list of things I am passionate about! Even greater, Peter Menzel has another book called Material World where he photographed families all over the world with all their earthly possessions. It is a stark, revealing look at what matters and what materialism is about. I think this would nicely lead us right into a more in depth look at countries and families around the world.

My hope is to grow an appreciation of our lives and the provisions the Lord has made for us. We can never be joyful or thankful enough for all the blessings he pours down on us everyday.