All School Virtual Cultural Pavilion

Each year, Morganton Day School students choose a different Spanish-speaking country to study. This school year, our students chose Cuba.

MDS’ Spanish instructor, Carolina Barbosa-Treviño, works with each grade level throughout the school year to teach students about the food, festivals and flags of the country. Deeper connections to the country’s economics and government are also made.

The cultural immersion traverses grade levels and subjects, for example, the humanities lessons in the upper school centered around communism since Cuba is a communist country. Physical education classes focused on cultural dance and art education spotlighted Cuban art.

Cultural awareness and community involvement are paramount to this discovery. Señora Barbosa met a Cuban restauranteur, Betty Sperry who owns the Cuban Cafe in Black Mountain. To connect students with Betty, Señora Barbosa filmed students asking questions in Spanish, presented the videos to Betty and filmed Betty responding.

This year-long study culminates at the end of the school year with a presentation of the student’s findings called “The Cultural Pavilion”. In a typical year, each grade level would present their findings to parents and caregivers in person but of course this year, the Cultural Pavilion is virtual.

The link will connect you to a virtual art museum/gallery (it takes a minute or so to load) where you can “walk” through and view Betty’s virtual interview, songs, dance and more!