Embracing Diversity: Sharing Our Songs and Rhymes
Project summary
The Embracing Diversity: Sharing Our Songs and Rhymes project is a multi-lingual compilation of children’s songs and rhymes accompanied by additional educational content. This innovative resource is intended to give children, parents, grandparents, care givers, teachers and the community at large an opportunity to learn about cultural diversity and inclusiveness. By offering a way to explore various cultures in Burnaby and New Westminster, Embracing Diversity will help develop our capacity to create communities where every resident, regardless of where they are from, is better understood, respected and has a greater sense of belonging.
The resource will consist of video performances and an accompanying print guide. The videos will have introductory comments, plus two traditional and well-known songs or rhymes from each of 15 different languages representing the communities of Burnaby and New Westminster. The print guide will include translations and phonetic representations of each song or rhyme, tips on how and why to use this resource, related activities and other culturally relevant materials to help anyone further engage children and families. The final product should be of practical use and general interest to both educators and the general public and will be available on-line through the Burnaby Public Library website.
The selection of languages below was chosen to represent languages spoken in significant numbers; languages spoken by groups that are new or have shown recent growth; and languages that help welcome or orient people to Canada.
- Arabic
- Cantonese
- Dari
- English
- Farsi
- Filipino
- French
- Hindi
- Korean
- Mandarin
- Punjabi
- Russian
- Spanish
- Urdu
- Vietnamese
The Embracing Diversity project launch is scheduled for the third week in February 2011. There will be a celebration at the completion of the project followed by several training sessions for interested users during the months of February and March 2011.
Embracing Diversity supports cross-cultural understanding, builds mutual respect, encourages curiosity and will hopefully foster a desire to know about cultural diversity. This project is made possible through funding from the Immigrant Integration Branch, Ministry of Advanced Education and Labour Market Development and is a Welcoming and Inclusive Communities and Workplaces Program Public Education Project. The lead organization is the Burnaby Family Life Institute on behalf of the Burnaby Intercultural Planning Table. Project research and coordination is led by Burnaby Public Library.
For more information contact:
Joyce Pinsker, Project Manager
Phone: 604-436-5415
E-mail: joyce.pinsker@bpl.bc.ca
Project updates
August 31, 2010: Volunteers have been recruited for all languages. We are working on finalizing the selection of songs and rhymes as well as preparing for videotaping sessions in the early fall.
August 10, 2010: The project coordinator, Sara Lee, has resigned from BPL to further her education. Please contact Joyce Pinsker for further information about Embracing Diversity: joyce.pinsker@bpl.bc.ca or 604-436-5415.
July 16, 2010: After consulting with the Spirit of the Children Society and the BC Aboriginal Child Care Society, in consideration of the complexity of selecting an aboriginal language and songs, it has been decided that the project will not include an aborignal language at this time. We will be substituting Urdu.