The chattering and cultural music overlap each other as people walk around in the commons. Smells of different foods fill the air, as adults and children alike can make connections with different stands. There would be crowds of people seen at different stands as students teach about their country.
Culture Fair is an event that occurs near the end of the year and takes place in the commons. It’s operated by 7th grade ELA and social studies teacher, Mr. Klumpenhower and the 7th graders are often running the show. Mr. Klumpenhower assigns each 7th grader their own country to research on, which they eventually present to anyone who visits the event, allowing them to have the chance to learn more about different countries.
For 7th grader Jennifer Bui, she’s hard at work on her Culture Fair poster that almost all of FWPA will be able to see at the event. “My country for Culture Fair is Brunei and the hardest thing about it is that it’s a small country so it’s hard to find information about the country and its culture,” Jennifer explains. She had also mentioned that the amusement park was her favorite assignment. The amusement park assignment is something that Mr. Klumpenhower assigns his students as preparation for Culture Fair to help students learn more about their assigned country and culture so that they have the ability to show cultural knowledge. Despite the struggles of how long it was, and you had to sketch different things, it allowed her to express her creativity into a project she was proud of.
In addition, Evan Tay also finds Culture Fair projects to be challenging. “My country is Pakistan and I would say the hardest thing is coming up with designs for the poster that I’m gonna make and present, even though you could fill it up with research, it’s hard to make it look good,” Evan sighed. Although he may have good research about his country, he struggles with the design and his worries on making his poster look nice.
For the future 7th graders of FWPA (or for the 7th graders who will be doing Culture Fair soon), here are some words of advice from people who already have some experience with Culture Fair. “I would say that if you’re about to do Culture Fair, you would want to get a lot of props for your project, make sure to do extra research and overall, just try to do extra work and make sure your poster will look detailed and decorated,“ Elena Nguyen explained. She emphasized that research is important, mentioning that she wishes she had done the extra bits, like fun facts.
In summary, Culture Fair is a fun event for almost all of FWPA to attend and the 7th graders are hard at work. Once you go to the actual event, you can learn all sorts of things about countries you know and also countries you didn’t even know about in the first place. During Culture Fair, we can all connect by culture.
