Explore and Celebrate Cultural Traditions
Three CD-ROMs from Pentewa Interactive, Inc. feature the folk art traditions of China, Mexico and Native America. Mexico’s Day of the Dead, a bilingual English/Spanish program, takes students on an interactive tour of a Mexican village. Students can visit folk-artists in the marketplace, decorate the cemetery, help prepare for the holiday in a Mexican home, and make colorful crafts. Exploring Rock Art — A North American Field Trip lets students discover the petroglyphs left by the continent’s first peoples. Students research rock art through an Internet-enhanced curriculum, observe and record their discoveries in an explorer’s journal, create their own petroglyphs and pictographs, present slide shows, and develop a museum of the art they produce. Chinese Shadow Puppet Theater, a bilingual English/Mandarin program, introduces students to the world of Asian shadow puppet theater. An animated puppet play is presented, and instructions are presented for students to design their own puppets, write their own plays, build a theater, and create scenery.
Each CD-ROM provides a complete curriculum for the educator. The program’s activities are based on the following goals: Learn, Create, and Celebrate. Students learn about different cultures through art, music, history and folklore; they create designs and stories; and the software encourages cognitive involvement through performances, ceremonies and exhibits. Pentewa Interactive, Inc., Seattle, WA, (206) 329-5519 www.multiculturalarts.com.
This article originally appeared in the 10/01/2000 issue of THE Journal.