It is the Muslim holy month of Ramadan and Muslims the world over are fasting from dawn until sunset in spiritual reflection. I make a point of visiting the classrooms of my elementary-school aged children during this month to do a presentation on Islam. Teaching about world religions, including Islam, is a requirement of our state's standards, but because of the contentious nature of teaching about religion in the classroom, it is often avoided by teachers.
This fear of teaching about religion doesn't stop our schools from hosting many representations of Christianity. In winter, my kids' school has a winter program with songs featuring a Christmas theme. A song for Kwanzaa and one for Hanukkah are thrown in for good measure. But there has never been a mention of Islam. Once, I asked the principal to make a simple Eid Mubarak (Happy Holidays) greeting on the day of the winter concert because it also happened to be the day of Islam's greatest feast day, Eid Al-Adha. He said he wouldn't make the greeting and really couldn't make a case for why. It was okay for Santa to greet the kids and for them to sing about Rudolph, but to wish the many Muslim families of the school happy holidays was not acceptable.
I hope some of these resources below will help you begin introducing Islam to your students.
Georgetown University's Center for Contemporary Arab Studies has published a teaching module called an An Introduction to Islam by Susan Douglass. It is available for free download at the link above.
The Islam Project is a multi-media site offering many resources for teachers. The site includes several lesson plans including one on identifying and fighting stereotypes.
The PBS video series, Islam: Empire of Faith has a website with lesson plans that can be used with the documentaries.
A wonderful free, print resource is the magazine Aramco World that focused on the Arab and Muslim world. Each issue (6 issues per year) has classroom activity suggestions that correspond with the articles. The latest issue has a nice piece on the origins of chess. The photos are beautiful and multiple copies can be requested for classroom use.
Islamic art with its repeated patterns and bold geometrics offers ample opportunities for teaching math. Here is an introduction to symmetry and pattern through a study of oriental carpets.
Dar al-Islam offers summer teacher institutes for K-12 and university-level educators in the beautiful setting of Abiquiu, New Mexico.
The Teachers' Institutes are two-week residential programs for educators. They normally begin on the first Sunday evening following July 4th. The program is intensive, and covers the faith, civilization and world-view of Islam. There are morning and evening lectures, study groups, and research work in the library and media-room. The participants learn about resources to assist them in teaching about Islam more effectively. They study Qur'an and Hadith with Muslim scholars who have strong academic or traditional credentials, and are able to relate easily with a variety of North American educators.
Georgetown University's Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding will help your school district arrange a custom-designed presentation on teaching about Islam at no cost. The Center even covers the cost of lunch for the teacher participants. University Schools of Education can also use this service for pre-service educators.
Islam is a subject about which whole libraries have been written, yet many teachers perceive it as one of the most difficult topics in the curriculum. It has been required in state standards for well over a decade, along with content on all the world religions, and in the wake of the September 11, 2001 and increased US involvement in Muslim regions of the globe, knowledge about Islam and Muslims is at a premium. It is a daunting task for teachers to prepare material that fits into the limited time available, that meets constitutional guidelines for teaching about religion, is correlated to standards, and is appropriate for various grade and ability levels.
These professional development workshops sponsored by the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding will address the needs of teachers on all of these levels, giving them confidence that they are on solid legal and pedagogical ground, providing content knowledge and helping them integrate the content into their curriculum and standards.
I am not a Muslim, but I have studied Islam and have consulted with many educational specialists on this subject. I can recommend these resources without hesitation. If you have questions or additional ideas for teaching on this subject, please leave them in the comments.
I'll write another diary soon about teaching about the Arab world.