May is Asian American Pacific Islander (or AAPI) Heritage Month in the United States, so it’s a great time to talk about how people from those parts of the world have shaped American history and culture.
AAPI Heritage Month began as a weeklong observance in 1979. The week was chosen because of some important dates in Asian American history, including when the first Japanese people arrived in the United States (May 7, 1843) and when the transcontinental railroad, which many Chinese immigrants worked on, was completed (May 10, 1869). AAPI Heritage Month because a permanent, monthlong observance in 1992.
As with other heritage months, this is a great time to talk about AAPI leaders and history makers, research their lives and more.
A great place to start is Google Arts & Culture, which has a great collection on Asian Pacific American Cultures. Here you’ll find images, videos, information about artists, famous women, trailblazers in their fields and more. If you’re looking for people to highlight or for your students to research, this is a great place to start.
Education.com has a free download for an Asian American Pacific Islanders leaders poster, which features 25 people you can learn about in the classroom.
Leave the Door Open on Etsy has a collection of 18 posters you can print out and hang around the classroom or use as a bulletin board. Depending on how many kids are in your class, this might be enough to give each person someone to learn about.
You can find more printable biography pages from Little Birds Teacher on Teachers Pay Teachers. These include biographical details so they’re great to hang in the classroom if you aren’t having kids research them (34 people are included in this set).
Colorful Years on Etsy also has print and color bookmarks with Asian American figures on them. This set includes 148 bookmarks featuring 37 people, from Anna May Wong to Kalpana Chawla, Bruce Lee to Yo-Yo Ma.
Twinkl has a free teaching pack for AAPI Heritage Month that’s perfect for third to fifth grade. There are also lots of other resources there including printables for the bulletin board and research activities for AAPI icons like Kamala Harris, King Kamehameha and Vera Wang.
For older kids, talking about Japanese internment is an important part of Asian American history. Britannica Kids has a detailed lesson about interment, or you can explore documentary information from Children of the Camps, a film that aired on PBS and focused on kids in the camps. Or read They Called Us Enemy by George Takei, who was interned with his family as a child.
If you’re looking for more books, Imagination Soup has a great roundup of books with Asian characters, from picture books to reads for young adults.
And while AAPI Heritage Month is about people from those places who have come to America, it’s handy to know exactly which parts of the world are included in Asia and the Pacific Islands. Little Birds Teacher also has a set of printable country pennant flags, which can be printed in color or in a black and white version for kids to color in. You can find these on Teachers Pay Teachers, too.
I haven’t gotten to many countries in Asia or the Pacific Islands yet, but you can learn more about American Samoa if you want.
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