World history and world geography came to life on Thursday, April 3 at Berean Christian School. For the second straight year, Berean’s sophomore history students, under the direction of teacher Richard Roberts, transformed the school’s auditorium into a series of 21 tabletop nationality/country displays.
The event was called World Heritage Day. At each display, there were detailed descriptions of the various countries. Images, pictures and various accessories were used to bring each display to life.
“Our students at Berean Christian School have diverse backgrounds,” said Roberts, now in his fifth year teaching history at the school. “By staging World Heritage Day, we allow the students to showcase their own family heritage and share that information with the entire school.”
The countries represented were China, France, Scotland, England, Germany, Italy, Ireland, Mexico, Puerto Rico, Jamaica, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Cuba, Colombia, Trinidad & Tobago, the United States, Argentina, Brazil, Ukraine, Poland and Russia.
“World Heritage Day is a chance to take learning of world history, geography and social studies to a new level,” said Marsha Cruz, high school principal at Berean. “Our students, teachers and administrators all enjoyed the experience,”
At each booth, background information on the country was shared via PowerPoint presentations, student-designed brochures, and various student-made signs, posters and charts. Throughout the day, Berean’s entire student body, faculty and school administrators visited the series of exhibits to listen and learn from the presentations that took place at each booth.
The students who were stationed at each booth were often dressed in clothes that reflected the country they were representing. In many cases, food from the various countries was prepared and served to those in attendance. For example, samples of black beans and rice were available at the Cuba booth, pizza was served at the Italy display, the Argentina exhibit had cheese and beef empanadas, Cadbury chocolate was given away at the England booth, chocolate cake was enjoyed at the Germany exhibit, rice and chicken were served at the Haiti booth, and fortune cookies were on display at the China booth. Those who visited the Cuba booth were given a chance to play dominoes, which is a very popular activity in Cuba.
Berean students really enjoyed the food.
“The empanadas were really good,” said junior Liz Britton, who worked the Colombia booth last year.
“The cake served at the Germany exhibit was really good,” added junior Mateo Aristizabal, who also worked the Colombia booth last year.
“I really enjoyed the Morir Sonando drink served at the Dominican Republic,” noted junior Michael Nelms, who worked at a Vietnam display last year.
The students who manned the national booths also enjoyed sharing their research and information with their fellow students.
“I felt really connected to the students, and I enjoyed helping them understand and comprehend the information we presented,” said sophomore Tenli Krauel, who was connected to the China booth.
“I really enjoyed the process of doing research on Scotland, displaying it on a poster, and sharing it with the students, especially the younger students,” added sophomore Alena Antoniak, who was affiliated with the Scotland booth.
Many of the younger students at the school were required to visit the booths and come back with proof of each visit in the form of a stamp that was produced by each country display. The younger students were given a “passport” by their classroom teachers to collect each national stamp.
Some of the interesting facts revealed during World Heritage Day included Colombia having coastlines along both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans; explorer Christopher Columbus discovered Haiti in 1492; the Mexican flag features an eagle eating a snake on a cactus, which is symbolic of an Aztec legend; the French eat 25,000 pounds of snails each year; “The Soldier’s Song” is the national anthem of Ireland; and Scotland, where the official animal is the unicorn, has a 3,000-year-old tree known as the Fortingall Yew. Roaming around the room at World Heritage Day was sophomore Colton Davis, a linebacker on Berean’s football team, who was dressed as a leprechaun, to symbolize Ireland.
According to Roberts, plans are already underway for next year’s World Heritage Day at Berean Christian School.
