Culture in the Cupboard

To carry out the National Geographic assignment titled, "Culture in the Cupboard", in terms of cultural capital and pop culture, I would modify the task slightly. I do feel as though this lesson plan is different and interesting I feel as though things can be tweaked a little to make it more relevant to a lesson on popular culture. I would change the task of bringing in 10 items to three items one from each area of interest. If their family values reading very highly and they all read Harry Potter together before bed then I would ask them to bring in a copy of one of their books. If certain families were a part of Rainbow Families, an organization for GLBT parents and their children, I would ask them to bring in a t-shirt or pictures from their times spent at one of the Rainbow Families summer camps for example. Let's say that one of my students was part of the Quaker faith, I could have them bring in a parent to talk to the rest of the class about what it means to be a part of this community. The list could go on forever! I feel as though limiting this lesson to two to four hours is depriving our children of a possible chance to feel validated and to introduce a possible new aspect of popular culture that may be different from their peers. I feel that an activity like this holds great importance and should not be simply skimmed over. After all every culture does not mean American culture and every culture does not recognize our popular culture as their own.