Here in San Antonio, we are actually closer to Mexico than we are to any other US state. Being as close as we are, there is a lot of Mexican cultural influence, from our Fiesta and Día de los Muertos celebrations to the fantastic restaurants and art.
As always, here is a list of videos we watched. We originally did some study back in 2018 before I got all organized about it. These were some of the videos we enjoyed then:
- Mexico Geography - introduces all of the states of Mexico and their capitals
- Animated History of Mexico in 3 Min - obnoxious intro screen, but good general overview
- The History of Mexico | History Lists - a list of cool historical facts from the History Channel (NOTE: talks about human sacrifice, with some basic illustrations)
- National Geographic Kids - Pyramid - great for very little kids, these kids travel to Chichen Itza and learn about the ancient Maya
Here are the videos that we enjoyed in 2019 while learning about Mexico the second time around:
- Geography Now! MEXICO
- Flag/Fan Friday MEXICO - we only watched the first part about the Mexican flag
- Geography GO! MEXICO - our Geography Now! buddy travels to Mexico
- Mistakes NOT TO MAKE in Mexico City - since we live pretty close to Mexico, we thought it would be good to get some travel tips in case we decided to visit. These types of videos are also good for highlighting differences in cultural and social norms.
- Top 17 Coolest Places to Visit in Mexico - the narrator is slightly grating, but he does cover some beautiful places in Mexico, most of which are off the beaten path.
For food, we went to our local HEB and picked up some fun treats. There was an entire section of shelves that had snacks from Mexico. We tried their spicy peanuts (something like this) and some lime cucumber Gatorade (a flavor we hadn't seen anywhere else before coming to the area, and similar to aguas frescas). I think we also got some sort of galleta - something sweet that I knew my kids would enjoy. We topped it all off with a trip to Tlahco Mexican Kitchen. It claims to be very authentic, and all dishes are served on what appears to be handmade terracotta dishes.