Background information and activities from over 20 countries.

Take students in grades PK–2 on a field trip without leaving the classroom using Children Around the World: The Ultimate Class Field Trip! This 160-page book includes cross-curricular activities that foster social and cultural awareness through reading, writing, math, large and small motor activities, science experiments, art projects, dramatic play, and cooking. Students keep journals, collect pictures and postcards, and map their journeys. This book supports NCSS standards.

Christmas is more than just gift-giving. It holds a much deeper meaning that has something do with Jesus Christ and the history of Christianity. If you trace its historic roots, you can see that the first Christmas was actually the beginning of a worldwide change. Treat this book as a prelude to the Christmas celebration. Grab a copy today!

An introduction to Christmas discusses the origins and development of the holiday and its traditions, its religious and cultural significance, its commercialization, and related topics.

Christmas helps children to find out more about this important Christian festival—from the birth of Jesus to different Christmas traditions. Readers are introduced to aspects of preparation, such as Advent calendars, cards and decorations, and the festival itself with family gatherings, church services, gifts, and carols.

This book is an invaluable resource for enabling teachers, religious educators, and families to learn about religious diversity themselves and to teach children about both their own religion as well as the beliefs of others. The traditions featured include indigenous beliefs throughout the world, Native American spirituality, Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity (Orthodoxy, Catholicism and Protestantism), Islam, Sikhism, and other beliefs such as Bahá'í, Unitarian Universalism, Humanism, and Atheism. Each chapter highlights a specific religion or spiritual tradition with a brief discussion about major beliefs, misconceptions, sacred texts, and holy days or celebrations. This summary of each tradition is followed by extensive annotated recommendations for children’s and adolescent literature as well as suggested teaching strategies. The recommended literature includes informational books, traditional religious stories, and fiction with religious themes. Teachers, religious educators, and family members will find the literature from these genres to be invaluable tools for bridging the religious experience of the child with that of the global society in which they live.

Promote reading and literacy with this wonderful assortment of lively, fast-paced, fun-filled children's programs specifically designed for children aged 4 through 8. You and the children will delight in such program themes as Creepy Crawlies, Forest Friends, Frosty Frolics, and After School Adventures. The book presents an entertaining mix of multisensory activities that appeal to a variety of literacy levels and learning styles—rhymes and songs, awesome activities, crafty crafts, and great games. Unlike other programming guides, this one uses a developmental approach with literature-based activities fitted to specific learning needs. More than an idea book, it includes all the nuts and bolts for initiating children's programs—from foundations and guidelines for understanding various stages of learning to everything you need to get started: book lists, step-by-step instructions, reproducible patterns and illustrations, even tips on publicity and public relations. Whether you're a novice or a seasoned children's programmer, this book gives you fresh programming ideas that foster lifelong literacy and love of reading. Grades PreK-3.

This is a comprehensive history of the world's midwinter gift-givers, showcasing the extreme diversity in their depictions as well as the many traits and functions these characters share. It tracks the evolution of these figures from the tribal priests who presided over winter solstice celebrations thousands of years before the birth of Christ, to Christian notables like St. Martin and St. Nicholas, to a variety of secular figures who emerged throughout Europe following the Protestant Reformation. Finally, it explains how the popularity of a poem about a "miniature sleigh" and "eight tiny reindeer" helped consolidate the diverse European gift-givers into an enduring tradition in which American children awake early on Christmas morning to see what Santa brought. Although the names, appearance, attire and gift-giving practices of the world's winter solstice gift-givers differ greatly, they are all recognizable as Santa, the personification of the Christmas and Midwinter festivals. Despite efforts to eliminate him by groups as diverse as the Puritans of seventeenth century New England, the Communist Party of the twentieth century Soviet Union and the government of Nazi Germany, Santa has survived and prospered, becoming one of the best known and most beloved figures in the world.