Asia

Learn about the history, cultures, and geography of the nations and peoples of Asia from this sampling of great educational resources that can be found on LEARN NC.

Ornately carved and painted Women's Gate into the Imperial City at Hue. (Photograph by Margery H. Freeman. More about the photograph)

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Related pages

• Salt trading in Asia: In this interdisciplinary lesson, students explore the mineral salt from a variety of perspectives — scientific, geographic, and cultural. The lesson incorporates images of salt production in Nepal and Vietnam, and may be used with grade 4 or grade 7.
• China's ancient engineers: In this lesson for grade seven, students will learn about some of the inventions of ancient China, and will discuss the kinds of engineering skills required to produce them.
• Modern China: The dam debate: In this lesson for grade seven, students learn about the Three Gorges Dam in China and the controversy surrounding its construction. Students will take on the roles of people whose lives may be affected by the dam, and will participate in a debate about it.

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• Learn more about Asia, China, Japan, ancient civilizations, geography, history, and social studies.

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Lesson Plans

East Asian Trading Ships

Each student will work with a partner as an owner of an overseas shipping company with one cargo ship in East Asia. Students are given these instructions in the overview: In each Asian country that you travel to you will fill your cargo ship with items that you can buy from the list of exports. You will then try to sell these items when you travel to another country that is willing to import these commodities. The winner of the game is the company with the biggest profits at the end of the pretend 15 day time period. Good Luck!

The world of Haiku

In this lesson, students explore the traditions and conventions of haiku, comparing this classic form of Japanese poetry to a related genre of Japanese visual art and composing haiku of their own.

Assessing political boundaries

In this Xpeditions lesson, students are introduced to the changing nature of political boundaries in Asia. This lesson is one in a series developed in collaboration with The Asia Society, with support from the Freeman Foundation, highlighting the geography and culture of Asia and its people. The activities include individual practice and small group collaboration.

Investigating central Asia through maps

In this Xpeditions lesson, students use physical, political, and thematic maps to investigate the geography of Central Asia through a scavenger hunt. Students will explore ways in which the region of Central Asia is defined and will create their own map-based scavenger hunt for other students to solve.

Asian, African, or Australian Inventors & Inventions

The lesson integrates both Social Studies and Language Arts in a research and a creative writing component. The student will further understand inventors or inventions from Asia, Africa, and Australia, the focused continents in the 7th grade Social Studies curriculum, as well as have the opportunity to develop his/her writing, reading, and oral communication skills. The project also incorporates mathematics with an emphasis on percentages and graphing.

More lesson plans about Asia

Websites

AskAsia for Students

In the student section of the AskAsia website, there are readings organized by country about a wide variety of topics from origami to religions to Asian stereotypes. Students will also find timelines, activities and games, photographic images, and maps.

The Art of Asia

Chinese dynasties and art, Japanese woodblock prints, scrolls and screens, and Japanese Buddhism and Tibetan sand mandala. Hundreds of objects and discussions about selected works of art. From the Minneapolis Institute of Arts.

Timeline and Maps of China

Follow the skills, craft and technology developed by China from the artwork from tombs at the most ancient archaeological sites to clothing, homes and artwork of today. From the Visual Sourcebook of Chinese Civilization.

Illuminating Development

60 photos from Africa, East Asia, Europe and Central Asia, Latin America, Middle East and North Africa, and South Asia illustrating the theme of empowerment through access to information, inclusion and participation, accountability, and local organizational capacity.

The Legacy of Genghis Khan

This exhibition looks at the important artistic and cultural achievements that occurred in the Iranian world as a by-product of the Mongol invasions of western and eastern Asia.

More websites about Asia

Multimedia

LEARN NC has published beautiful images of the countries and people of Asia. Audio recordings take you to the streets of Southeast Asia. These resources are from our multimedia section. Here is a sampling of what can be found there.

Contemporary Life in Vietnam

This slideshow offers a look at post-war Vietnam. Although Vietnam remains a communist state and traditional cultures persist, economic reform and increased interaction with the West have led to bustling markets, international trade, and a changing society.

Cambodia and Southern Vietnam

Unlike northern Vietnam, which for thousands of years was heavily influenced by Chinese culture, southern Vietnam, Cambodia, and present-day Laos were more influenced by the culture and religions of India. The Chams of Southern vietnam and the Khmer of Cambodia established kingdoms in the first millenium CE with roots in Hindu and Buddhist models of authority, and the remaining temples, cities and other architecture of these cultures, including the great temple of Angkor Wat built at the heart of the Khmer Empire, tell their stories.

Cao Dai religious music and singing

This audio file of music and singing was recorded during one of the regular Cao Dai religious ceremonies that occur four times daily.

Negotiating a taxi ride to hotel in Vietnam

This recording illustrates how people must negotiate a price for a taxi ride in Vietnam since there are no meters.