Grab your passport, pack your curiosity, and get ready for another adventure! Our next Passport Journal journey takes us south of the United States to the beautiful and fascinating country of Mexico!
September is a wonderful time to make Mexico one of our classroom destinations. Hispanic Heritage Month begins September 15, and Mexican Independence Day is celebrated September 16, giving us the perfect opportunity to explore Mexico while also introducing children to the rich and diverse cultures, histories, and contributions celebrated throughout Hispanic Heritage Month.
And there is SO much for little learners to discover!
Ancient pyramids and modern cities. Rainforests and deserts. Beautiful beaches and towering mountains. Music and dancing. Art and architecture. Fascinating animals. Indigenous history. Family traditions. Spanish language. Delicious foods.
Mexico is so much more than a few familiar symbols children may recognize.
So let's open our Passport Journals and start exploring!
First Stop: Where Is Mexico?
Every good journey begins with a map!
Discovering Mexico with a Fact Booklet
Now that we've arrived, it's time to learn more about our destination!
My Mexico Fact Booklet was created to introduce young learners to Mexico through simple, age-appropriate nonfiction reading.
Children can discover important facts about the country while practicing reading, research, comprehension, writing, and observation skills.
But don't stop at simply reading the facts!
5 Books to Take Us to Mexico
Books can transport children somewhere new without ever leaving the classroom. Add a few of these wonderful read-aloud books to your journey.
1. Off We Go to Mexico! by Laurie Krebs
Travel through Mexico while discovering its landscapes, celebrations, foods, history, and culture. This makes a fun companion to a classroom "trip" to Mexico.
2. What Can You Do with a Paleta? by Carmen Tafolla
A colorful celebration of the Mexican paleta that also introduces children to community, sensory language, imagination, and everyday culture.
3. Dear Primo: A Letter to My Cousin by Duncan Tonatiuh
Two cousins, one living in Mexico and one in the United States, exchange letters about their everyday lives. It's a wonderful way to help children notice similarities and differences without presenting one culture as "exotic."
4. Dreamers by Yuyi Morales
A beautifully illustrated story about family, books, language, dreams, and making a home in a new place. It can lead to gentle conversations about immigration and the importance of stories.
5. Funny Bones: Posada and His Day of the Dead Calaveras by Duncan Tonatiuh
Introduce older K–2 learners to Mexican artist José Guadalupe Posada and his famous calavera artwork while connecting history, art, and Mexican culture.
After reading, encourage children to add something new to their Passport Journal: Draw Your Way Through Mexico! We've read about Mexico. We've found it on the map. Now let's DRAW it!
My How to Draw Mexico resource gives children another way to explore the country through simple directed drawings connected to what they are learning.
Children might draw Mexican landmarks, cultural objects, foods, animals, plants, music, or other symbols associated with the country.
Directed drawing is much more than an art activity.
As children follow the steps, they're practicing: listening and following directions, visual observation, fine motor control, sequencing, shapes and spatial awareness, persistence and confidence, and while they're drawing, keep the conversation going!
Suddenly art, geography, social studies, vocabulary, and oral language are all happening together.
5 Classroom Activities for Our Mexico Journey
Let's add even more experiences to our Passport Journal adventure!
1. Become Mexico Geography Detectives
Give children a simple map of Mexico and investigate together. Locate: Mexico City, Gulf of Mexico, Pacific Ocean, United States, and Yucatán Peninsula
Then compare Mexico's location with where your students live. For young children, even understanding near, far, north, south, land, and water builds early geography skills.
2. Explore an Amazing Mexican Landmark
Take a virtual or photographic trip to Chichén Itzá or another important archaeological site. Ask children:
Who do you think built this?
How do you think they built something so large without modern machines? What shapes do you see?
Then let children recreate a pyramid using blocks, LEGO-style bricks, paper shapes, or recycled materials.
History just became a STEM challenge!
3. Listen to the Sounds of Mexico. Play age-appropriate examples of Mexican music. Introduce children to instruments they might hear, such as guitars, violins, and trumpets, and explore how different musical traditions create different sounds. Let children clap a rhythm, move to the music, or create simple classroom instruments.
4. Learn a Little Spanish! You don't have to teach an entire language lesson to help children discover that people around the world communicate in different languages.
Introduce a few useful Spanish words.
Children LOVE realizing they can communicate something in another language!
5. Mexico: Same and Different
After several days of exploring, create a class chart:
Mexico and Our Community; What things seem different?
What things are similar? Children in Mexico go to school.
They play. They have families. They celebrate special days. They listen to music. They eat favorite foods. They have pets. They play sports. They have hopes and dreams. This may be one of the most important lessons of our entire Passport Journal journey:
Cultures can be different AND people can have many things in common. From Mexico to Hispanic Heritage Month our visit to Mexico gives us a wonderful starting point for another important September celebration. Hispanic Heritage Month is celebrated September 15 through October 15.
But here's an important idea to help young children understand: Mexico is one country. Hispanic heritage includes people and cultures connected to many Spanish-speaking countries and communities. That distinction matters.
Instead of presenting Hispanic culture as though everyone eats the same foods, listens to the same music, celebrates the same holidays, or follows the same traditions, we can help children discover something much more interesting:
There is tremendous diversity within Hispanic heritage!
People have roots in Mexico, Spain, the Caribbean, Central America, South America, and many different communities within the United States.
Each has its own stories, traditions, foods, music, art, history, vocabulary, and experiences.
My Hispanic Heritage Month Fact Booklet helps introduce these ideas in a way designed especially for K–2 learners.
Children can explore kid-friendly information about Hispanic people, language, music, foods, and traditions while building nonfiction reading and comprehension skills.
They can also research, make personal connections, sort facts, create a craft, and choose from cross-curricular activities that extend their learning into reading, writing, math, science, and art.
Most importantly, the goal isn't simply for children to memorize a collection of facts. It's to encourage them to become curious. What languages do people speak?
What traditions are important to different families?
Where did those traditions begin? What music do people enjoy? What stories have been passed from one generation to another? What contributions have Hispanic people made to our communities and our world?
Those questions can take our learning far beyond a single month.
Our Passport Journal isn't about collecting stereotypes or checking countries off a list. It's about helping young learners understand that our world is filled with different people, languages, landscapes, traditions, histories, and ways of life—all worth discovering.
So as we say ¡Adiós, México!, let's leave our little travelers with one final thought:
Don't just visit the world. Be curious about it.
Because every new culture we learn about gives us another opportunity to understand our wonderfully diverse world—and one another—a little better.
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