Glimpse of Cambodian Culture through a Photo (Snapshot)

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Glimpse of Cambodian Culture through a Photo (Snapshot)

Cambodian man and woman at the Cambodian New Year Parade in Long Beach

Author: Sandr Kipfstuhl
Grade: 5

Suggested Amount of Time: 55 minutes
Area of Study: Introduction to Cambodian History

Compelling Question
  • How does learning about Cambodian history promote a greater understanding of Cambodian American experiences?
Lesson Question

  • What information can you gather about the Cambodian people by analyzing different photos

  • What can we learn about the history and culture of a people from the art/music they create?  

Lesson Objective

Students will be able to conduct research and make inferences, finding evidence through the photographs, then compare and contrast similarities and differences using multimedia to better understand Cambodian culture.

Lesson Background

No specific prior learned background information is needed, but rather former knowledge of one's own and other cultures, based on previously viewed photos. Culture can be defined as shared behaviors, values, customs and beliefs in a society.  Culture will shape how a group interacts with the world around them. However, the teacher should have a clear understanding of the Cambodian cultures presented through the previewed photographs to clarify and help guide students through analysis of the photographs. They can reference this resource if they need additional information https://www.britannica.com/place/Cambodia/Cultural-life. 

Image Citation: Cambodian man and woman at the Cambodian New Year Parade in Long Beach.

Photos
  • Royal Ballet Cambodia Apsara Mera photo 
  • Cambodian New Year Parade Photo 1  
  • Cambodian New Year Parade Photo 2
  • Cambodian Wedding Photo 
  1. Warm-Up 
  • Ask students to think about their culture. Give them about five minutes to peruse the internet and have them select one photo that best represents their culture.
  • Have students share the image with an elbow partner. Pairs should have a discussion of what can be learned about the culture based on that one photo.
  • Allow students to share their photos to the whole class. Teacher should emphasize to the class that a lot can be gathered from looking at photos.
  • The teacher should then introduce the lesson questions and objectives.
  1. Interaction with first source
  • The teacher should first model and demonstrate the process of analyzing a photo with the whole class by sharing the Cambodian Royal Ballet photo.
  • The teacher should go over appropriate analysis of photographs, remembering that if they make an assumption about what is happening in the photograph, they should make sure that they can point to specific evidence found in the photo itself. Then, the teacher can walk students through researching specific aspects of the photograph and symbols/objects they may see in them (this can include showing students how to use reverse-image searching, or google searching with key terms).
  • Teachers should model how to identify and answer the following questions. The questions can be answered on personal notes or on the board.
    • Who is in the photo?
    • What are the people doing?
    • What objects are in the photo?
    • What seems familiar to you?
    • What is unfamiliar from your own experiences?
    • What questions do you have about the photo?
    • What can we learn about the Cambodian community from this photo?
  1. Interaction with second source
  • In small groups of two to three students, the teacher should hand out copies of the three photos (New Year photo 1 and 2, and wedding photo) to each group.
  • Each student in the group should choose one photo to analyze. Students should then be tasked to answer the following questions for their chosen photo:
    • Who is in the photo?
    • What are the people doing?
    • What objects are in the photo?
    • Based on what you see, what do you find familiar?
    • What seems unusual?
    • What questions do you still have about the photo?
    • What can we learn about the Cambodian community from this photo?
    • How do you think the additional information will help you understand the culture of the photographed people better?
  • Each student will then share their chosen photo and their findings to the rest of the group. Each member will have a turn to share their photo. The teacher can put a visual timer on the board to make sure everyone in the group has a chance to present the analysis of their photograph. 
  1. Shared Learning
  • The small groups will then create a list of similar insights they found in looking at the photos. This can be written down or typed online.
  • The teacher will ask each group to share one aspect of Cambodian culture they observed through the photographs. The teacher may have to clarify any aspect of Cambodian culture that may be incorrectly interpreted or questions students may have had while analyzing their photographs. This again, can be done through modeling online research. 
  1. Assessment
  • The teacher will then guide students to reflect on the following questions with an exit ticket or quickwrite:
    • How does analyzing a photo help us better understand Cambodian culture? What can we learn about what’s similar and what’s different between our own culture and Cambodian culture through a photo (snapshot) analysis? What is obscured about Cambodian culture by relying on a photo or a set of photos?
  • Optionally, students can create their own hand drawn image of their understanding of Cambodian culture. As students create their drawing, have them consider why they are choosing to add certain elements or colors to the product. Students should be prepared to share why they created the image the way they did.
    • Possible sharing responses:
      • “I decided to add this element of __ to illustrate ways in which Cambodian culture…”
      • “This part of the drawing resembles…”

Using analysis of photos, students will be asked to make inferences, finding evidence through the photographs, then compare and contrast similarities and differences in the cultures presented in the photographs and their own. Optionally, students can create their own hand drawn image of their understanding of Cambodian culture.

Engagement: Consider the following method to support with lesson engagement:

  • Differentiate the degree of difficulty or complexity within which core activities can be completed 
  • Display the goal in multiple ways

Representation: Consider the following method to support with multiple means of representation:

  • Use cues and prompts to draw attention to critical features

Action and Expression: Consider the following method to support in presenting their learning in multiple ways:

  • Provide differentiated models of self-assessment strategies (e.g., role-playing, video reviews, peer feedback)

For additional ideas to support your students, check out the UDL Guidelines at CAST (2018) http://udlguidelines.cast.org.

Emerging: Consider the following method to support with emerging students

  • Speaking: Assign roles in group work
    • Ground rules or guidelines for conversations are used as the basis for constructive academic talk. Teacher provides judicious corrective feedback during student talk. 

Expanding: Consider the following method to support with expanding students

  • Speaking: Require full sentence responses by asking open ended questions 
    • In response to a prompt, the teacher offers a sentence frame orally and/or in writing to support expression of student thinking. Frames are adjusted based upon specific grammatical structure, key vocabulary, content learning, and language proficiency level descriptors, etc. Frames are a temporary scaffold that require modification.

Bridging: Consider the following method to support with bridging students

  • Speaking: Require oral reporting for summarizing group work 

For additional guidance around scaffolding for multilingual learners please consult the following resources:

  1. Review inference definition, and use the photo modeled by the teacher; discuss inference(s) and share examples. This is a good opportunity to add discussion about both possibilities and the perils of relying on photographs for insights and deep understanding about cultures.
  2. Discussions on the photographer and their biases can also be delved into through the photograph for further exploration.

Britt, K. 2020c, May 11. English learner toolkit of strategies. California County Superintendents. https://cacountysupts.org/english-learner-toolkit-of-strategies/

California Department of Education & English Learner Support Division. 2012. California English Language Development standards (Electronic Edition) kindergarten through grade 12 (F. Ong & J. McLean, Eds.). California Department of Education. https://www.cde.ca.gov/sp/el/er/documents/eldstndspublication14.pdf

California Educators Together. (n.d.). ELA / ELD framework. https://www.caeducatorstogether.org/resources/6537/ela-eld-framework

Cambodia | History, Map, flag, capital, population, Language, & Facts. 2023, November 27. Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/place/Cambodia/Cultural-life

CAST. 2018 The UDL guidelines. http://udlguidelines.cast.org

File:Royal Ballet Cambodia Apsara Mera.jpg - Wikimedia Commons. 2010, October 10. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Royal_Ballet_Camboda_Apsara_Mera.jpg

Programs, & Programs. 2023, November 15. Chhayam Performers - Historical Society of Long Beach. Historical Society of Long Beach - Where History Lives! https://hslb.org/chhayam-performers/

Salazar, A., & Salazar, A. 2023, October 18. Cambodian Buddhist Monks and Elders leading the Parade - Historical Society of Long Beach. Historical Society of Long Beach - Where History Lives! https://hslb.org/cambodian-buddhist-monks-and-elders-leading-the-parade/

Salazar, A., & Salazar, A. 2023b, October 19. Bride and groom in the passing of the blessing ceremony - Historical Society of Long Beach. Historical Society of Long Beach - Where History Lives! https://hslb.org/bride-and-groom-in-the-passing-of-the-blessing-ceremony/

San Diego County Office of Education. (n.d.). Providing appropriate scaffolding. https://www.sdcoe.net/educators/multilingual-education-and-global-achievement/oracy-toolkit/providing-appropriate-scaffolding#scaffolding

Tulare County Office of Education. (n.d.). Strategies for ELD. https://commoncore.tcoe.org/Content/Public/doc/Alpha-CollectionofELDStrategies.pdf 

Model Curriculum

Cambodian American Studies

Standard(s)

RI.5.7 W.5.3

Grade(s)

Grade 5