Diversity and the Winter Holidays

The Winter Holidays provide a wonderful opportunity to celebrate the diversity that naturally occurs in adult literacy education.  While much of America is focused on Christmas and the various traditions that go along with it, adult literacy educators can use this time of year as an opportunity to help students learn about, and develop an appreciation for the different holidays and customs that are celebrated this time of year.  How does your program celebrate the winter holidays?  How might you modify those celebrations to reflect the cultures and customs of your adult literacy learners?  Can you look at your program data to see which countries and faith traditions are represented and do a celebration of holidays around the world?  Can you invite students to share about which holidays are observed in their countries of origin or cultures this time of year?  Can you have conversations with students whose faith traditions prohibit celebrations to see how they prefer to handle any celebrations?  How can we turn these celebrations into opportunities to learn about the cultures represented in our classes, and to learn about customs from around the world?