Teacher's Guide for FACES ^® Finland

Photos of international Yukigassen play as well as the rules are available online at www.earthcape.ne.jp/users/sobetsu/yuki/yuki_e.html.

Sweating It Out
Today's Finns use some of the most modern technology available, applying modern advances even to traditions like the sauna. Current estimates are that there are 1.6 million saunas in Finland today. With a population of 5 million, Finland certainly is a nation of sauna-devotees. Throughout history other peoples have enjoyed similar bathing customs. You and your students may wish to use the following chart to compare and contrast Finland's sauna with Roman and Turkish baths, the sweat lodges of Native Americans, the Japanese furo, the Russian banja (or bania), and the Mexican tamascal.

Information about the baths of different cultures may be found online at www.cyberbohemia.com/Pages/sweat.htm.

Finland Through Time
Create a timeline to compare American / United States history with that of Finland. You may wish to use wide ribbon to make the line on a classroom wall and have students create markers of pertinent dates on two colors of index cards (one color for Finland, one for America / US).

If you wish to add more dates to those offered on pages 12 - 13, you will find online chronologies of Finnish history at:

• http://virtual.finland.fi/finfo/english/chrohist.html
• www.finland.org/histeng.html

In addition to information offered in innumerable books, online chronologies of American / United States history are available at:

• www.geocities.com/Athens/Atrium/1977/
• http://mailbox.univie.ac.at/~mayerk3/historya.htm

The Sami
You and your students may wish to incorporate information on the Sami in the timeline you created comparing Finnish and American history. Use a third color of index cards to represent Sami history. A chronology of the Sami people is available online at www.itv.se/boreale/history.htm.

You and your students may wish to use the following chart to summarize the historical and current situations of the Sami people. You and your students can find more information on the Sami online at:

• www.itv.se/boreale/samieng1.htm
• www.sametinget.se/english/
• www.lysator.liu.se/nordic/scn/faq23.html
• http://virtual.finland.fi/finfo/english/saameng.html

In addition, you and your students might like to explore the following books about the Sami:

• Lewin, Ted. The Reindeer People. New York: Macmillan, 1994.
• Reynolds, Jan. Far North: Vanishing Cultures. Vanishing Cultures Series. San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1992.

The Language that Refused to Die
Finnish bears little similarity to other languages even in its own group. You and your students can hear Finnish spoken on educational audio cassette tapes generally available through public libraries. These tapes include:

• Conversa-Phone Institute. Finnish. Ronkonkoma, NY: Conversa-phone, 1978.
• Berlitz Schools of Languages of America. Berlit Finnish for Travellers.

In addition, if your computer has Real Audio, you and your students can hear Finnish via computer at the following sites (you may download Real Audio via the web site link):

• Christmas greetings from the Sibelius High School Chamber Choir
• Sylvia's Christmas song
• "The Finnish Land," a poem

A Traditional Christmas
If your class is studying Finland close to Christmas, you may wish to spend some time exploring the ways Finn celebrate the holiday. You and your class can learn more about Christmas in Finland online at http://virtual.finland.fi/finfo/english/xmas.html. You might use the questions and answers about Father Christmas as a starting point for a celebrity interview with students writing up their interviews for the class newspaper. You might have them develop their own Christmas cards with a Finnish perspective.

CHRISTMAS FEAST
Explore the Finnish Christmas Feast by sharing a few Finnish dishes with your students. A number of Finnish Christmas recipes are listed at http://virtual.finland.fi/finfo/english/joulreng.html. To prepare Christmas Glogg, substitute red grape juice for the red wine and omit the Madeira and vodka.

You may wish to have students compile a list of what they and their families traditionally eat on Christmas. How does the student's list compare with the foods listed in the article on the Finnish Christmas feast on page 24 or the recipes listed on the Virtual Finland web site?

Finnish Foods
Have students use the article on pages 26 - 27 to create a menu for a day's meals. Then have students record what they ate for the day. How do the two lists compare? What similarities exist between the two lists or are the lists totally different? If your students wish to explore Finnish recipes, a number are available online at http://virtual.finland.fi/finfo/english/recipes.html.

Singing the Stories
The literature of many nations began in oral tradition - stories that were passed verbally from one generation to the next for countless years before being written down. You and your students may have such an oral tradition operating on a smaller level in your families. Are there stories that your parents, grandparents, aunts, or uncles have been telling for years? Generally, you recognize the story as soon as its teller begins the tale and, although you've heard the tale countless times before, the story continues to captivate its audience. Have your students take their family stories from oral form to written form. Does their story capture the rhythm of the oral version? Does their story provide all the detail of the oral version?

Symphonic Poems
In composing Finlandia, Jean Sibelius wrote a symphonic poem. Also called tone poems, these compositions are a generally a piece of music in one movement played by an orchestra. They usually begin with literary inspiration and have their roots in the real world. The music gives the impression of what it is trying to convey. For example, drums might sound like a clock or a flute passage might indicate birds. In addition, the name of the piece usually indicates what the poem is about. You and your students might enjoy listening to Sibelius' Finlandia as well as other symphonic or tone poems such as Don Quixote by Richard Strauss and Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet by Tchaikovsky.

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Updated: 7/20/08 06:48 pm
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