Our school is having an “International Day” in a few weeks. Each child is supposed to pick a country (preferably, if possible, one from which their ancestors came or with which they have a particular cultural affiliation). They are supposed to dress in some sort of cultural costume, give a short presentation, and provide some food from that culture for an international potluck.
My daughter chose to do Ireland (must be all that Irish music she hears around the house!). For the food I think we’ll make soda bread, unless someone else has a vegetarian suggestion that might be better. The presentation’s easy…she’s going to learn a tune on the whistle (probably “It’s Not Yet Day,” or something equally easy). What’s sticking me is the “cultural costume” bit. Any ideas (other than just dressing her all in green, which might get the idea across, but doesn’t strike me as particularly “cultural”…reminds me more of the American observance of St. Patrick’s Day than it does of Ireland). Help?
One of the twins is my wife. They do accurate research for their historical clothing. No renn-faire-hollywood stuff. (Apologies to any ren-faire musicians out there.)
Boy, a pretty nervy teacher, I’d say!
How would they expect a working mom to come up with all this stuff,
when most mom’s of grade-school age kids drag themselves home
exhausted from work, barely get dinner on the table and its 9 p.m. and
everyone is in bed.
You and your daughter must be special people to even go along
with such an idea! I think most Americans out there wouldn’t
have a clue as to where their families even came from.
All the costumes are so complicated too, looking at the ones on the
Net. You might have to just go with a white peasant blouse and
green skirt and black bodice; but finding those at a cheap price or an easy-to-make pattern is still a lot to expect from a parent!
Lolly
You might try finding out how young Irish children would dress today and just go with that if there’s something distinctive. If you go back to the 1950’s there would have been quite a difference in the way Irish and American children dressed then. I have no idea whether there still would be.
Boy, a pretty nervy teacher, I’d say!
How would they expect a working mom to come up with all this stuff,
when most mom’s of grade-school age kids drag themselves home
exhausted from work, barely get dinner on the table and its 9 p.m. and
everyone is in bed.
You and your daughter must be special people to even go along
with such an idea! I think most Americans out there wouldn’t
have a clue as to where their families even came from.
All the costumes are so complicated too, looking at the ones on the
Net. You might have to just go with a white peasant blouse and
green skirt and black bodice; but finding those at a cheap price or an easy-to-make pattern is still a lot to expect from a parent!
I don’t think so - pan-western youth culture and clothing is pretty uniform all across europe and, as far as I can judge, the States. They might listen to different boygroups, yes.
What about a step-dancing costume? This looks very celtic, and something riverdancish might even be recognized.
Well, this sort of thing is one of the things we love about the school. Integrated learning seems to work so well for some kids.
This is a private school for academically gifted kids, so all us parents expect to have to go the extra mile sometimes. Nearly all of us volunteer at the school (a minimum of 20 hours per year per family is required, but many of the parents give much more than that). Fortunately, area employers are generally willing to give people the kind of flexible schedules they need to make this kind of program work (not necessary in my case, as I’m a full-time mom, but a godsend for a lot of parents).
This past week, my daughter and a partner sponsored “Inca Day” for their class’s ancient civ. class. We spent the week making the food and working on a play for them to give. Great fun, and they learned more about Inca culture than I think I’ve ever known. It’s a lot of work, but it pays off. I sure wish I’d had a school like this when I was 10!
Thanks for all the good ideas, folks! We do have a store here called “Closet Capers” that specializes in used “vintage” and “dramatic” clothing…I might be able to find something there. I also suddenly remembered that one of the girls in the Morris troupe used to be a step dancer…she might have something we can borrow.
