This week’s country in our Around the World in 11 Weeks series is India! India is the second most populous country and a beautiful one to learn about! In addition to its natural beauty, it has amazing architecture and festivals. Check out all the resources below to study India and grab the FREE printable portion.
Note: For ideas on how to organize your unit study, visit the Around the World in 11 Weeks main page.
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Printable Unit Study
The printable portion of the unit study contains India Notebooking Pages, a Map Scavenger Hunt, a Following Directions activity, a math activity about Indian currency, Famous People notebooking pages, and book summaries. Grab it below! (21 pages)
Videos About India
This video from Christian Missions in Many Lands is a really good overview of India. (11 minutes)
A visit to India from National Geographic (5 minutes)
For something shorter: (1:27 minutes)
Go on safari in India with the Travel Kids (7 minutes)
If you have older students interested in the history of India, check out this series of videos from Crash Course.
Research More About India
Kids World Travel Guide contains a lot of information about India along with beautiful pictures.
Ducksters has a variety of information about India including information about the geography, economy, and government of India as well as famous Indians with links to learn more about them.
National Geographic Kids has a slideshow of related pictures, fast facts, the history of India and more.
Cool Kid Facts has a narrative version of facts about India written in a larger font making it good place for younger children to learn.
Hands On Activities
Make a Taj Mahal art project and watch this video.
Here are several crafts you can make for Diwali-Festival of Lights. Watch this video, too, to learn about this festival full of beauty.
Learn about the art form of henna, which has been practiced in India for hundreds of years, with this Henna Hands craft. You can learn more about the meaning of Indian henna designs here.
Make these origami Lotus Blossums while learning about the Lotus Temple. Here are 13 facts about the Lotus Temple.
Make Indian Food
Much of Indian food is served with Basmati rice and is either vegetarian or made with chicken. You can pick up naan, Indian bread, at many grocery stores to serve with the following dishes. You may need to pick up or order some new spices to make some of these dishes.
For dessert, try a rice pudding!
You could also learn to make chai-spiced Indian tea.
Famous Indians
Included in the printable portion of the unit study there are notebooking pages for the following famous people of India. Here are some resources to research them:
Akbar the Great: Research, Video
Mahatma Gandhi: Research, Who Was Mahatma Gandhi?, Video
Mother Teresa: Research, Who Was Mother Teresa?, Video
Deepak Chopra: Research, Video
Mukesh Ambani, businessman: Research
Deepika Padukone, actress: Research, Video for older students
Virat Kohli, cricket player: Research, Video
Play Indian Music
Find an Indian playlist on your favorite streaming service or listen to this collection from youtube.com.
Learn Hindi
Here is a video for older students to learn some basic Hindi, the language spoken by the majority of people who live in India.
Listen to picture books in Hindi.
Duolingo is another free way to learn Hindi.
Non-fiction Books About India
For older students:
Fiction Books About India
Preschool, Early Elementary:
Other books for elementary grades:
Middle School:
Movies About India
Jungle Book is set in India and is available to rent on Amazon.
India Nature’s Wonderland is a show on PBS.
Mystic India: An Incredible Journey of Inspiration is available through Amazon Prime.
“Go to” India
Here is a list of five museums in India with links to their virtual tours.
Here is another list of eighteen museums with virtual tours from India’s Ministry of Culture.
And here is a virtual tour of the Taj Mahal.
India does not have many webcams, but you can check out these two webcams in Indian temples.
Download Printable Activities
What other activities have you used to learn about India? Let us know!
Other ideas for learning about countries around the world:
This Post Has 2 Comments
Good day,
There seem to be a problem with the link to download the printable activities. It takes me to the Convertkit website.
Thanks,
Christine
Thank you so much for letting me know! There was some kind of glitch with our email service provider. Strange! Anyway, I recreated the form and just tested it and it is working now.
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