Lakeland Mirror

Issue date: 11/12/09 Section: Features

Media Credit: Miho Kaimori A young girl learning how to use chopsticks.

On Oct. 22, some international students from Global Student Association (GSA), an organization that was set up to help Lakeland students learn about other countries, gave presentations about their home countries to the kindergarten and first grade classes at Zielanis Elementary School in Kiel.

When compared to large cities in the U.S., such as New York, Los Angeles, or Chicago, there are not that many opportunities for those living in small towns to learn about other countries and cultures.

However, Zielanis Elementary School offers a unique opportunity to its pupils. They have a motivational reading program every year, and they invite Lakeland students to read to the elementary students.

The theme of this year's reading program is "Reading Takes Us Places," and it is offered to students from kindergarten through fourth grade. The students "visit" a different continent every month.

Lakeland students from Japan, China, and Burma gave presentations about Asia. They separated into each country, and each group taught four classes of kindergarten and first grade students.

Japanese students introduced their traditions and technologies. Most kids were surprised that many games and popular animations, such as Pokémon, are produced in Japan. The students also demonstrated Japanese traditional paper craft, origami. They helped the kids make hats from newspaper.

Chinese students also did paper craft with scissors and it really caught the heart of the kids. They also showed Chinese traditional calligraphy to the kids.

Students from the Burma group began their lesson by enjoying a conversation with the kids. Then, Swe Swe Htay read a book to the kids, and taught students how to say "I love you" in Burmese.

There were good questions from the Zielanis students about the different cultures. It was a good opportunity for them to learn about cultures and people from far-away countries. There are not many Asian students in the school, and Asian cultures are totally different from American culture, so these presentations helped broaden the kids' world.

Before leaving, Lakeland students ate lunch with the kids. They spread out and sat at different tables, and both sets of students were able to learn a lot of things about each other.

Visiting an elementary school was a great opportunity for the international students to experience a standard American elementary school. Since there is almost no chance for international students to meet young American kids in daily life, the GSA members really enjoyed the day.

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