Written by Jim McAlpine, Betty Weincek, Sue Jeweler, and Marion Finkbinder

This book provides background information on all the nations in Central and South America and on some Caribbean Islands.

The At-A-Glance Section provides background information for each country followed by interdisciplinary activities in the areas of the Arts, Math, Language Arts, Science, and Social Studies. Activities call for the higher-order thinking skills of analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. Following the interdisciplinary activities is the TOMORROW portion for each country. This activity is designed to enable students to demonstrate their ability to synthesize and evaluate the information provided or researched into reasonable, rational, and justifiable predictions.

Following the At-a-Glance Section is a Create-Your-Own Activity. It asks students either independently or in a group to choose a Person, Place, or Event related to the country and conduct appropriate research to create a single, At-A-Glance, background paragraph of information about that Person, Place, or Event. That Person, Place, or Event then becomes the foundation to create a related activity for each of the five disciplines.

Also included are Overarching Activities designed to enable students to see and appreciate the interconnections between and among the nations of Latin America.

Finally, students will ponder “What If?” questions and combine research and critical, analytical, and “out-of-the-box” thinking to generate and justify their responses. Grades 6–8.