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Curriculum Links

Introductory Activities

Learning Activities

Assessment Activities


Curriculum Links:

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Introductory Activities:

1. Feelie bags: Find objects that relate to Cambodia – rice, fish sauce, toy cow, length of checked cloth for a kramah (traditional long cotton scarf), palm sugar, incense, palm leaf, piece of twisted metal, toy gun etc, depending on age group.  Put one object in each bag and give a bag to each small group.  They take turns to feel inside and guess what the object is.  Then they look inside, identify it and say what it tells them about Cambodia.

2. Where are we? Show the front of the “Fields of Hope” poster, covering the website addresses, and ask students where they think this is – what climate, what part of the world, what country?  What clues are there in the photos to tell them that?  If they have not guessed, tell them that this is Cambodia – show it on a map.  What do they know or think about Cambodia?  What would they like to know?

3. Photo sort: Sort the photos from the “Fields of Hope” poster (link to Poster) into sets that seem to go together, and give a label to each set.  Sort and label again in a different way.  What do these photos tell us about these people?

4. Silent Movie: Buy or borrow the video “Seasons of Change”.  Start the video just after the title, with the sound off.  Stop every minute or two so students can guess where this might be, what might be happening and what they think this video is about.

5. Questions: Do this after doing one of the other starter activities. As an individual, a group or a whole class (depending on class level), write the focusing question for your unit in the centre of a piece of paper:

L1: How is life in Cambodia affected by the seasons, and how has it changed over time?

L2: How have the upheavals of the country’s past affected the lives of people in Cambodia?

L3: How did the ideas and actions of the Khmer Rouge regime affect the lives of people in Cambodia at the time, and how is this still affecting people’s lives today?

L4: What were the causes of the upheavals in Cambodia during the Khmer Rouge regime, and how did these events shape the lives of Cambodians, at the time, and into the present.

Underline the key words.  For each key word, think of questions that could help you to find out about that aspect of the unit.  Lastly, look at the focusing question as a whole.  Try to think of more questions that will help you to learn enough to answer the focusing question.  During the unit, come back to these questions and see how many you can now answer.

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Learning Activities:

Select a range of activities to suit your class.

6. Calling cards: Read the stories about Navy and her family in the Our Family section of the website.  In a group, make six cards, one for each person in the family.  Each card should include the person’s name, age, their place in the family (mother, sister etc), the jobs they do and one other interesting thing about them.

7. Charades: In a group, read the stories about Navy and her family in the Our Family section of the website and then take turns to act out the role of one of the people in Navy’s family.  The rest of the group tries to guess who you are and what you are doing in your mime.

Variation: If you have already done activity 6, Calling Cards, each group member could draw a card from the pile to decide which member of the family they have to act out.

8. Video: Borrow or buy the video “Seasons of Change”. Show only the family section (first 9 minutes) and instruct students to look for:

How the family’s life is affected by the weather and the seasons (Level 1)

How the family’s life has changed over time, and how it has stayed the same (Level 2)

9. Day PMI: In the Our Story section of the website, read the Navy’s Day diagram to find out all the things Navy does in a day.  Draw up a double-T chart and head the columns “Plus”, “Minus” and “Interesting”.  If you were Navy, what things would you like about your day?  Write these in the “plus” column.  What things would you not like?  Write these in the “Minus” column.  In the “Interesting” column, write things about Navy’s day that are neither positive nor negative, but are just interesting.

10. House model: Make a scale model of Navy’s house, using the diagram on the Navy’s House website page for clues.  Include models of the furniture inside the house.

11. Income change: Read the first half of the website story, Getting Food.  Make a list of all the things the family used to do to get food or money.  For each thing, calculate how much the family grew or earned in a year (be careful – some things only last a few months each year).  Now read the second half of the story.  Make another list of ways the family get food or money now, and calculate how much they get from each.  Add up the two lists and work out how much more the family used to be able to earn, when the children’s father was alive.

12. Physical facts: As a class, select suitable facts from the Country Facts website page (eg how many people, how much room, how many children survive, how many people have clean water…) and demonstrate them by grouping yourselves.  For example, to show how many people have clean water, work out how many people represent 30% of your class.  These stand up while the others stay seated, to show the proportion of Cambodians who have clean water.

13. Map: Copy the map of Cambodia on the back of the “Fields of Hope” poster and colour it, using blue for the sea, rivers and lake and green for the surrounding countries.  Find Cambodia on a map of the world and measure approximately how far it is from New Zealand, and how far it is from the equator.

14. Flood: As a class, examine the Backwards River diagram on the Geography website page and mime the changes in the Tonle Sap Rover and Lake.  Use chalk to mark out the course of the river and the lake on a tennis court or similar.  Students represent the water, and flow in different directions to show the different seasons.

15.  Active cycle: Read the rice cycle on the Growing Rice website page, and either copy down or print out the words in each pop-up box.  Mark the months around the room, or around a tennis court or field. The class moves around the markers, starting at May/June.  At each point, one person reads out the tasks that Cambodians do during that time, while the rest of the class act it out.

16. Rice seasons: Copy the rice cycle diagram on the Growing Rice website page.  In the centre of the diagram, draw a circle and mark the twelve months on it, putting June at the top to match the months of the cycle.  Read the information about the wet and dry seasons on the Climate website page (the teacher could provide this information for younger students).  Divide your circle into sections for the seasons and colour the dry season in yellow, the wet season in blue and the transition time in May green.  Colour the diagram boxes to show the season for each activity.

17. Cambodia Day: Hold a Cambodia day in which everyone “spends the day in Cambodia”.  Include some or all of the following activities:

·        Try making a few of the Cambodian dishes from the Recipes website page.  Put on a Cambodian meal for your class, invited staff members, your parents, or invite another class to share it with you.  To make the occasion really special, dress in Cambodian clothes, play a tape of Cambodian music and decorate the room with checked cloths and photos of Cambodia.

·        Use the information on the Clothing website page to find out what Cambodians wear.  Find things that look similar to the clothes Cambodians wear, and use them to dress as a Cambodian.

·        Look at the map of Navy’s house on the Navy’s House website page.  Use a tape measure or long ruler to draw an area of your playground or classroom the same size as the house.  In a group of four, sit in the sitting area and lie down as if you were Navy’s family going to sleep.  How does this house compare with your own home?

·        In a group, choose one of the games from the Games website page, assemble everything you need and then try playing it.

·        Try carrying water, or collecting firewood, like Navy does.  You could make this a race between teams, or time how long it takes to carry a bucket of water a certain distance.

·        Simulate fishing by bending a wire coathanger into a long hook (like the one Navy is holding on the poster), making “fish” and “crabs” from paper and placing them in the sandpit (to represent a pond).  Students take turns to try to hook the fish or crabs with the hook.

18. Model tree: As a group or class, use the diagram on the Food website page to make a model of a sugar palm tree, including all the parts of the tree that people use.  Add labels or attach a separate key to show what people use each part of the tree for.

19. Old and new: Look carefully at the photos on the “Fields of Hope” poster to find things you think people would not have had 100 years ago.  Mark them with a piece of blutac, or circle them on a photocopy of the picture.  Choose one of the pictures that does not have many new things.  Re-draw the scene as it might have looked 100 years ago.

20. Act Quotes: In a group, read the Khmer Rouge Time quotes from the back of the “Fields of Hope” poster.  Choose one quote and act out the event that the person is describing.  Make sure each of the quotes is acted out by at least one group.

21. KR Actions: Read the Khmer Rouge Time quotes from the back of the “Fields of Hope” poster, and the Khmer Rouge section of the History website page.  Highlight things the Khmer Rouge did.  Make a star diagram with the title “Things the Khmer Rouge did” using symbols or words to show the actions.

22. List effects: Divide the class into six groups.  Each group looks at one aspect of life – work, school, food, house, family life or health.  They use the quotes on the back of the “Fields of Hope” poster to find information about how their aspect of life was affected during the Khmer Rouge time.  Brainstorm other ways your aspect of life might have been affected, and add them to your list.  Present your findings to the class to build up a class list of effects.

23. Effect symbols: Enlarge the “Echoes of the Past” diagram on the back of the “Fields of Hope” poster onto a whole sheet of paper (photocopy sideways).  Add a drawing or symbol to each box to illustrate that effect.

24. Development display: Copy the headings from the diagram on the Change website page.  Give one point to each group.  They draw an illustration for their point, and write a brief heading.  Arrange the illustrations into a display.

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Assessment Activities:

Assessment activities are only for main objectives.

Level 1: Season pictures: Draw a picture of one thing that Cambodians do during the wet season to grow rice.  Draw another picture of one thing they do in the dry season to grow rice.  Write a sentence to describe each picture, beginning “In the wet season…” or “In the dry season…”

Level 2: Time Capsules: As an individual or a group, make two time capsules to show what life was like for one family during the Khmer Rouge time, and now.  Each capsule should contain at least five things that relate to that time.  Add labels or verbally report to say what each item is, and what it shows about the family’s life during that time.

Level 3: Scrapbook: Imagine you are a Cambodian who was your age during the Khmer Rouge regime, and that you collected things to help you remember what that time was like.  Make a scrapbook with the things “you” collected.  For each item, write a label saying what the item is, why it is important (or what event it represents) and how this affected your life.

Level 4: Diary entries: Imagine you are a Cambodian who was your age when the Khmer Rouge came to power.  Write two diary entries for “your” life – one for a day during the Khmer Rouge rule, and one for a day in recent years.  Each entry should say what is happening in your life, and how your life is affected by the events of the Khmer Rouge time.

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