Fourth and fifth-grade students at Randall Elementary School in Madison saw Hmong culture up close during a year-long collaboration that took them from a butcher shop in Green Bay to a traditional funeral in Middleton to a shoe factory in Wausau. Fifth-grader Sarah wrote, "Every place we visited changed my perspective."

Anne Pryor of the Wisconsin Arts Board, Ruth Olson at the Center for the Study of Upper Midwestern Cultures (CSUMC), and the Madison Children’s Museum teamed up with Mark Wagler’s students at Randall to explore Hmong culture and present it to a broad public through a web site “The Hmong Cultural Tour” (http://csumc.wisc.edu) and an exhibit, “Hmong at Heart” (http://www.madisonchildrensmuseum.com/exhibits/).

The class visited Hmong communities in Madison, Milwaukee, Sheboygan, Green Bay, Wausau, Eau Claire, and La Crosse. They had several classroom visits, including ones from a seventeen-year-old shaman, a former resident of the Ban Vinai refugee camp, and a Hmong instrument maker. The students documented Hmong culture by audio and video recording, taking pictures, sketching, and writing extensive notes.

Wisconsin has the third-largest Hmong population in the United States, with 33,791 Hmong residents, according to the 2000 U.S. Census. (California and Minnesota have the most.) Among other things, the students learned how Hmong culture has endured through centuries of dislocation and persecution by relying on a strong sense of family and community interdependence. "Before the trip I thought Hmong was just some bizarre culture, but now I know what the Hmong truly are," said Mariah, a fourth-grader.

Teacher Mark Wagler acknowledged that the trips are lots of hard work but the payoff is great. "Never before have I seen students learn culture in such great depth," he said. "It's the best social studies curriculum I've ever taught--folklore, history, geography, political science, economics, sociology, and psychology all integrated into one ethnographic project with local, regional, and international dimensions."

“Hmong at Heart” opened this January in Madison, and features a Hmong village in Laos, a Thai refugee camp, and a Hmong-American home. It is one of seven exhibits on Asian cultures created for children’s museums through a Freeman Foundation initiative. After completing its tenure in the Madison, “Hmong at Heart” will travel to ten sites around the country. The elementary students’ study of Hmong culture was part of the research process used by the Madison Children’s Museum staff to develop “Hmong at Heart.” Several short videos in the introductory section of the exhibit illustrate the role the 4th and 5th graders played in the development process.

Pryor, Wagler and Olson have written a manual to accompany the exhibit: A Kid’s Guide to Local Culture. Organized as a field guide, the book leads students in finding culture close to home. Its core content examines forty-two “cultural elements.” For example, the section on adornment begins with short discussions of ways people adorn themselves, from pierced ears to henna-dyed hands, to African-American hats and Pakistani-American jewelry. It continues with a more specific discussion of hair traditions and suggests, “Spend some time in a barbershop or hair salon to observe the many things people do to their hair.” Another discussion on hats concludes with, “Think about the forms of adornment you use in your everyday life. Which are to make you attractive? Which are part of another cultural identity?”

Two other educational manuals are available too: A Teacher’s Guide to Local Culture (written by Wagler) and A Field Guide to Hmong Culture (written by Dia Cha, Mai Zong Vue and Steve Carmen). All three of these manuals are available on line through the Madison Children’s Museum, the Wisconsin Arts Board and CSUMC. Printed copies can be purchased from the Children’s Museum.

Benjamin and Pakou, students from Mark Wagler's class, plant a Hmong garden in Randall School's outdoor classroom.

Pachee and Chrissy, two of our hosts in Green Bay, model different Hmong fashions (dressed up and encouraged by their moms!).

Gabby learns how to make eggrolls in Green Bay: "A lot of us had never done egg rolls before so it was a little difficult at first but as you kept going it got easier and easier."