The Chinese dragon

• Different cultures celebrate the new year in different ways. Ask students how their family celebrates New Year's Day. Look at the different cultural composition of the class and concentrate on the traditions that the children are familiar with first. 
• In pairs, ask students to select another culture and investigate how and when the new year is celebrated in that culture. Ask students the following questions:

1. When do they celebrate the change of year?
2. Do they have special foods to celebrate?
3. What other activities are involved in celebrating the new year?

• The following websites may be useful:

1. Chinese New Year, http://education2.uvic.ca/Faculty/mroth/438/CHINA/chinese_new_year.html
2. Wikipedia, 'New Year', http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Year

• Ask students to investigate why the dates for Chinese New Year are always changing.
• As an extension activity, students could research the calendars used by the ancient cultures of Egypt, China and South America.

• Divide the class into small groups and allocate a country to each group. Students are to research how each country celebrates the new year. They can present their findings to the class as a slideshow presentation or an interactive presentation.

Student Activity Sheet H14.7: New Year's Day traditions

• As a class, view the clip, The Chinese dragon, and discuss the importance of the dragon in Chinese festivals. Discuss the idea of symbolism and how symbols are used to share traditional meaning.
• Ask students to consider what the dragon represents in this clip. Discuss the dragon as a symbol of positive hope triumphing over fears for the future.
• Ask students to research and list the 12 Chinese New Year animals from the Chinese calendar. Ask students to develop a profile of their family members, particularly the year they were born and which Chinese New Year animal they were born under.
• The following websites may be useful:

1. Asia Education Foundation, Asia-related literary texts to support the Australian Curriculum for English, year 2, www.asiaeducation.edu.au/verve/_resources/Y2eltTITLEsb221110.pdf#xml=http://search.curriculum.edu.au/texis/search/pdfhi.txt?query=Chinese+New+Year&pr=www.aef.edu.au&prox=page&rorder=500&rprox=500&rdfreq=500&rwfreq=500&rlead=500&rdepth=0&sufs=0&order=r&cq=&id=4d8087b37b
2. ——,Now more than ever we live in one world, Key curriculum areas: Visual Arts, www.asiaeducation.edu.au/for_school_leaders/school_change/project_resources/now_more_than_ever_we_live_in_one_world/nmteb_key_curriculum_areas_visualarts2.html
3. Chinese Museum, www.chinesemuseum.com.au/

• Each student cuts out and decorates a section of the dragon using the template in Student Activity Sheet H14.8: Chinese New Year. Students illustrate each section with words and pictures of their hopes and issues they think are important for the future. Every student creates a link in the dragon. When complete, the dragon will stretch around a classroom or along a corridor. Groups of students can be selected to make the dragon's head and tail.

Student Activity Sheet H14.8: Chinese New Year

• Play the clip without vision. Ask students to make notes on Student Activity Sheet E14.7: Sights and sounds, listing all the different sounds they can hear, and then have them form groups of three to share and compare what they have recorded.
• After viewing the clip without watching the images, ask each group of students to agree about one thing they think will be seen in the clip, and to share the idea with the class. Ask students whose voices they can hear and whether they think the clip is set in the day or at night.
• Have each student use the storyboard on Student Activity Sheet E14.7: Sights and sounds to draw four moving image scenes they think will accompany the clip's soundtrack.
• Replay the clip, this time with both sound and moving images. Encourage students to share anything that surprised them.
• Ask the class to explain what is being celebrated, to identify the people who are celebrating and to describe ways they see and hear people celebrating. Encourage them to provide examples from the clip to support their ideas, paying close attention to all the different customs and traditions that can be seen such as clapping, Chinese dragon, lanterns and music.

• As a class, discuss the role played by Henry in this celebration. Why do you think he is involved? What have Henry and Franklin invented that is part of this Chinese New Year celebration? Is this invention a success? How do you know? What do you think the invention might symbolise?
• Assist the class to list celebrations they know about today that they have been reminded of by the clip. Accept all responses to build up a comprehensive list of celebrations from across cultural, ethnic or religious groups. Create a class chart that identifies each celebration, who celebrates it and why it is celebrated. For example:
  
  Birthday - celebrated by people of many cultures - to mark the anniversary of a person's birth

Student Activity Sheet E14.7: Sights and sounds

• After watching the clip, have students work in groups of three to list the main events, thinking about what happened, why and to whom. Have each group agree upon a title they would give the clip based on the events they have listed, and then as a class discuss and record the key events in the clip.
• Display a large Y-Chart with the topic 'Chinese New Year' and the focus questions:

1. What does Chinese New Year look like?
2. What does Chinese New Year sound like?
3. What does Chinese New Year feel like?

• Replay the clip several times, asking students to observe and listen carefully so that each student can contribute information to the class Y-chart.

• Ask students to research the significance of Chinese New Year. Encourage them to find out who celebrates it, when it is celebrated and how it is celebrated. The websites below may assist their research.

1. About Australia, 'Australian Stories: Chinese New Year', http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-story/chinese-new-year
2. About Australia, 'Australian Stories: The Changing Face of Early Australia', http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-story/changing-face-of-early-australia
3. Asia Education Foundation, http://www.asiaeducation.edu.au/default.asp 
4. Asia Society, 'The China Game', http://asiasociety.org/node/8688

• Invite a person from the Chinese community to speak about how Chinese New Year is observed and celebrated both in the past and today in Australian culture.
• Ask students to use Student Activity Sheet E14.8: Celebrating Chinese New Year to record their discoveries about Chinese New Year. A describing wheel is a graphic organiser that encourages students to describe facts and ideas relating to a topic. The wheel has a place for the topic in the centre, surrounded by spokes in which students can record facts and ideas.

Student Activity Sheet E14.8 Celebrating Chinese New Year