Identify family customs and traditions and explain their importance.

Log on to the network using personal username by the end of the first semester. Students may use index cards or labels containing username. (1C)       

Identify family customs and traditions and explain their importance.

P1

Open a new picture or an existing picture on the student-shared directory. (1C, 7A, 7B)

Describe customs of the local community.

Obtain information about a topic using a variety of visual sources such as pictures, symbols, television, maps, computer images, print material and artifacts.

Enter text. (2E)

Change font size. (10A, 10B)

Use the left click button on the mouse to select or drag objects on the screen. (2A)

Winter Holidays:  Hanukkah, Christmas, Kwanzaa with Kid Pix 3

Directions:

Before the computer lab activity:  You can supplement your holiday unit by downloading* any (or all) of these great videos from the KLRN/Unitedstreaming site on our intranet. Each teacher on the grade level does not need to separately download; just one of you can and place them in your staff shared Kinder folder on the server, then you can all play them on your televisions from your multimedia computers. (Make sure you all have accounts with KLRN and have downloaded Windows Media Player 9 before trying to watch them on your tv!) Just search by keyword for the following titles:

Holiday Facts and Fun:  Kwanzaa (about 10 minutes)

Holiday Facts and Fun:  Hanukkah (about 10 minutes)

Holiday Facts and Fun:  A Multicultural Christmas (very long; about 22 minutes, but some pull-out content is good)

Seven Candles for Kwanzaa (Good kid-friendly explanation of Kwanzaa; 10 minutes)

In the Month of Kislev (Two Polish families and the smell of latkes; 12 minutes)

Too Many Tamales (Maria makes tamales but where's mom's ring?; 13 minutes)

The Wondrous Candle (Romanian story of a Christmas Miracle; 10 minutes)

Lab activity:  Demonstrate this lesson in your classroom on your multimedia computer before your lab time so the students can become more familiar with the tools and menus.  This helps tremendously to avoid the little "What-do-I-click-now?" hands in the lab! Also, be sure to teach the "Undo Guy" tool and the Eraser tool, in case they want to change what they just did.

After the ten-minute warm-up on KidKeys, the students can do "Kid Pix Winter Holidays."  This lesson has students choose two of the winter holidays and make boxes with stickers and stamps that represent the two holidays. Then, using the pencil tool, they will circle the items that are the same in both holidays! Since Kid Pix 3 is so picture and icon-based, both Spanish and English classes can do it.

For complete, step-by-step instructions with pictures and where to find the right stamps, open and print this Word document. Do the lesson yourself first so you can see how you will need to modify up or down to your class's level.

Kid Pix 3 Winter Holidays

Higher Level Extensions: For students that finish early, have them think about and create a new Kid Pix 3 picture that represents the common items among all three holidays!

Modifications:  For more challenged learners, just identify and describe one holiday with its customs and traditions. 

Additional Activities:  When students are done, you can make shortcuts or a hotlist of these kinder holiday activities:

Billy Bear's Kwanzaa Tic-Tac-Toe

Lil-fingers Hanukkah Activities

Lil-fingers Christmas Activities

*Download Instructions for KLRN Site
Internet Explorer: There will be three letters to the left of the title of the video:  "s,", "d," and "a." Right-click the mouse and hold over download button (the little "d), then select "Save Target As." You will be prompted to save the media file. Choose the location you want the video to be stored on your system (your Desktop is the most common place).