Community building: Partner Introductions

Objective: Bring awareness of the importance of names and their rich family and cultural history
Inquiry Question: Why are names important to people?

Activity:
Have people interview each other in pairs. Each person will have three minutes to interview another person.
Each person will have one minute to introduce his/her partner.

Suggested interview questions:
o Is there a story behind your name? What is it? For example, was your name given to honor someone?
o Who gave you your name?
o Where does your name originally come from?
o What does your name mean? For example, the name Yee in Chinese means friendship.
o What is something positive about you or your name that no one can forget?

Honouring Student Voices: As a group, discuss the reasons why names are important to people.
Extending Learning: Why is it important to pronounce others’ names correctly?

Community building: Identity charts

Identity charts are a graphic tool that can help students consider the many factors that shape who we are as individuals and as communities. Use identity charts to deepen students’ understanding of themselves, groups, nations, and historical and literary figures. Sharing their own identity charts with peers can help students build relationships and break down stereotypes. In this way, identity charts can be used as an effective classroom community-building tool.

More detail here

Online variant here