Charlotte Teachers Institute

In this unit, students will learn about the American Muslim community with a focus on the challenges a highly diverse population brings to our daily lives. This unit aims at shedding light on the importance of adapting a culture of tolerance, as well as embracing the individual differences. It is about learning to appreciate our differences, and finding how these differences strengthen our community rather than tear it apart. Through a variety of fiction and non-fiction novels and articles, students will meet children and young teens who like many of them struggle with maintaining their identity or fading into the surrounding community. Students will also have the opportunity to research their own heritage, through the Family Heritage Project. The project will allow them to discover, reconnect and share their culture with their peers as well as to learn about their classmates’ culture, and finding things in common in order to create strong relationships.