Wednesday, May 23, 2007

What is the Opposite of a Canadian?

Last week we were doing an activity about the Civil Right Act of 1964. The kids studied the provisions of the act, and then they were supposed to imagine a fictional family of people who would have been impacted by the changes. I encouraged them to create a diverse family so that many different protected categories (race, religion, sex, etc.) could be represented. They had a great time inventing VERY diverse families. Soon there was a competition on to see who could come up with the most diverse family (okay, so they sometimes miss the point of certain assignments).

One girl had a Norwegian man married to a Jamaican woman with three adopted daughters from China, Russia, and India. Another played with extended family, while a third introduced the idea of steps. At one point I hear, from across the room, a girl yell "What is the opposite of a Canadian!?" That certainly stuck in my head as a very good question indeed. Tomorrow they have to turn their fictional families into narrative comparisons of life before and after 1964. We shall see how this goes.

So what is the opposite of a Canadian?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

The question is sheer brilliance in its nascency..

The opposite could be = naidanac