Cultural Virtual Field Trips
These virtual field trips are designed to transport your students to another place, another country, and another culture. Each link will take students to a tour of a different culture where they can learn to appreciate true cultural diversity.
Culture Quest World Tour
presented by Kidspace @ The Internet Public Library
http://www.ipl.org/div/kidspace/cquest/
Mascots Ophelia Owl and Parsifal Penguin
This site offers students the choice of several cultures to explore. The tour is broken into regions including Africa, Antarctica, Asia, Australia, Europe, The Middle East, North America, and South and Central America. Each link takes students to another menu of links that lists each country mentioned under the headings on the main menu. Each country under the regional heading has links to topics to explore such as holidays, recipes, crafts, museums, folktales, and animals. This site is an excellent springboard for more in depth looks at specific cultures or a place of comparison for multiple cultures.
Origami
from Japan National History Museum in Brazil God Ra from
Egypt
http://www.jlhs.nhusd.k12.ca.us/classes/social_science/Japan_Visit/Japan_Visit.html
This site chronicles a teacher’s actual trip to Japan. She has a descriptive narration of the events of her stay that make the reader feel as though they are right there with her. The teacher visited various traditional tourist attractions such as Shinto shrines, Buddhist temples, and Imperial castles; however she also visited an elementary and high school while there which will be of particular interest to students and teachers looking for a global perspective. The site also mentions other interesting topics like the teacher’s stay with her Japanese hostess, Japanese baseball, and riding on the Japanese bullet train. Not only is the narration easy to read and engaging, but there are photo galleries to accompany both school visits and some of the general sites of Japan.
View of the
city of Osaka Elementary school students A sacred
gate leading up to a shrine
http://www.destination360.com/peru.htm
This site contains descriptions of places, people, and cultural aspects of Peru’s society accompanied by numerous 360 degree moving views of famous locations like Lake Titicaca, Machu Picchu, and The Sacred Valley. The opening page gives a brief overview of Peru and each link to a location gives information on that location, the people of that location, and famous sites. Additional pictures to the 360 degree views show pieces of culture like reed bottles, textiles, and pictures of the locals.
Central Cusco Lima lit up at night The Pisac Ruins in Cusco
http://www.elbalero.gob.mx/index_kids.htm
An excellent site designed for young kids, but with useful information for any age level. The “About Mexico” section is of particular use for people interested in culture. It contains links to Indigenous Groups, Music, Holidays, Games, Recipes, Traditions, and Myths. The main page also directs users to information on Mexico’s history, government, biodiversity, and games. Each link contains additional links to more valuable information. For instance, the Indigenous Groups link takes visitors to a list of indigenous peoples and each of those links takes the student to links on that group’s language, dress, and customs.
Mosaic Pottery Indigenous Clothing One
of Mexico’s Monsters Butterfly Migration