One Day Museum

     The One Day Museum was an impromptu idea that has hung on for the long haul through May and will be around through the end of the school year and into summer day camp. I have been pleasantly surprised at the interest and enthusiasm the One Day Museum has created with students.
     The set up is simple, an old aquarium turned upside down on a side table holds an item for a day. Sometimes we have a worksheet to go along with it. There are days when someone just answers questions about the item. I love days when we leave it to the kids to talk about the item and see what they think. We have a monthly theme at our program for the students lessons and activities to revolve around, the museum item may or may not correlate to the theme.

   In this photo the museum holds an antique key. There was a lot of discussion about locks and size comparison to present day locks. Then when told the key was handmade and each was a bit unique the conversations tool a turn. I am happy when the children engage in one on one conversations and small group discussions ( informal) over the item in the museum. Like all museums they appeal to different clientele. Some items appeal to our 1-3 grade kids, some really get the 7th and 8th grade students interested. We have had a taxidermy duck, tools, model airplanes for flight month, live pollywogs, fossils and so many more items.
  

   The day the One Day Museum hosted seashells we had so many questions about the different shells. We talked about the sea, ocean ecology, the different types of shells the shell purpose and the make up of the shells. We talked about Native Americans and Pilgrims using shell fish and about the catching and cooking of different shellfish.
     The glass enclosure protects out Museum exhibit from too many fingers but it also teaches the students that some things in museums are only to look at not to touch. We are learning everyday with our One Day Museum and hope other schools and after - school programs will enjoy this idea and try it, please feel free to reply what item you might put in a one day museum.

Paper City another activity you might enjoy trying with school children: http://carolynstearnsstoryteller.blogspot.com/2014/02/a-paper-city.html

Here is a fun way to interpret fairy tale content - or any book for that matter:
http://carolynstearnsstoryteller.blogspot.com/2013/05/chalk-up-student-fairy-tales.html

 

Chalk It Up to Hans Christian Andersen

                                         The Flying Trunk - A Fairytale in Chalk

   Hans Christian Andersen penned the fairy tale “The Flying Trunk” The tale was first published in 1839. I chose it for a project at the after school I work in because of its relation to flying.  For the month of April the theme at after school  is, “I will fly – Volare”. The flying related fairytale was perfect to share as the storyteller at after school. The arts and after school programming go hand in hand. With the thermometer outside climbing to an early spring 50 degrees we headed to the sidewalk for our story.

   The young man in our story inherits a sizeable fortune only to squander it down to the last few coins. Now poor, his soul possessions are his slippers, and an old dressing gown. He needs to leave where he lives and does not know where to go. A friend gifts the young man a trunk. (I used the word suitcase to help the children define this kind of trunk) The young man has nothing to put in the trunk so he gets in himself. The trunk is enchanted; its magic lifts him off in a flight across the countryside to the land of the Turks.

 

      He flies through this foreign country like a bird under the sun and over the mountains rivers, villages and people working in the fields.

 

He comes to the palace of the Sultan and sees a beautiful Princess at a tower window.

 He flies up to her and in through the open window. The princess has been kept in the tower to avoid a prophecy that she would marry poorly. He visits several times, each time sharing stories to entertain her. As expected in a fairy tale, they fall in love.  The princess tells her parents of her suitor and they come to the tower to meet him.  He tells them a story, they enjoy it. He is a good looking young man with a magical flying trunk, they agree the couple  should be married!

In celebration of the wedding the young man buys a big box of fireworks. He flies over the city with the fireworks setting them off in the night sky.

He lands his trunk in the city to tell everyone his story and why he is lighting the fireworks. Sadly he does not watch over his trunk and the sparks of the fireworks cause it to catch fire. The fire incinerates his trunk,  nothing is left.

He can no longer fly to the tower to see his beautiful bride. She sits at the windows and her tears fall to the ground.

Once again he has nothing but his slippers and an old dressing gown. He wanders the streets of the land of the Turks telling stories.

I told the story to the children once straight through, then told it in pieces noting a section of sidewalk for each image they could draw. This was a chance to reinforce story sequencing with the children.They worked on their picture and visited up and down to see what others were doing. There was a lot of discussion of what things should look like. This allowed us to talk about what each person sees in their mind when they hear a story and differences in how they draw it with chalk. At the end we walked the length of the story and everyone told a part to go with their chalk drawing.

Our vocabulary words from this story:

Trunk                                  foreign                           Volare                   

Enchanted                         inherit                            possession

Turks                                  palace                             Sultan

Prophecy                           suitor                              entertain  

wander                              incinerates                    dressing gown

fortune                               squander

 

A Previous adventure with chalk and fairy tales:   http://bit.ly/1ei3XF5

A Paper City

    The after school program I work at has been making little paper houses, bigger paper churches and more. The Paper City Project introduces maps in a 3D lesson on the students home town. The cold winter days lent themselves to  coloring tiny buildings and cutting them out. From a simple hand drawn pattern the basic houses were crafted and the small collection grew along a window sill. We had a date for the display to be shared and we worked toward it.

      Snow cancellations, and a Monday holiday and more  kept us from making as many buildings as we first imagined but we made a fine representation. This view is less than a quarter of our city.

WHY?

    We learned about places in our town that children were unaware of. We learned how to give directions by the building location. We understand now that the mills are on the river and the train yards near the mills. Along with all our building we had a guest to share the paper city. The President of the CT Eastern Railroad Museum, Mark Granville, brought a length  of track, engines and cars so we had a real view of where the trains were in proximity to the town.  Thank You!http://www.cteastrrmuseum.org/

 We talked our way through the layout of the city by starting where we were and moving out from that point. Students had different buildings they were familiar with. Library, post office, schools, hospital and favorite food outlets were pretty easy. Smaller shops and businesses brought a lot more discussion as to which side of Main St and where in relation to certain churches or other dominant buildings. The entire discussion and placement process went well. Strips of  black construction paper became our roads and wavy blue pieces the Willimantic River.

      Students learned about Willimantic history, some heard the story of the Frogs of Windham, which is why we have a bridge with huge frogs on it! http://www.damnedct.com/the-frog-bridge-willimantic/  This story took place in 1754 in Windham, the town Willimantic is a part of.

     Here is an image of the plan I drew for the smaller houses. For the youngest students I outlined the cutting edge in colored pencil. Once cut out and the students name added we folded the creases and then flipped the house over to color on the windows, doors, siding and accessories. Some of these also became small businesses like Cafemantic and the Shoesmith. The final piece colored was the roof. Then we used glue sticks to assemble the house.

     A companion activity to this was a timeline around two sides of the room. Our theme for the month was Decades, so it was broken out in those increments. There were many pictures of historical Willimantic along the timeline. This was a fun project for the middle of winter and one I would do again with the kids.


Looking for some other winter type activities? http://carolynstearnsstoryteller.blogspot.com/2014/01/8-things-to-do-when-it-is-wicked-cold.html

This was fun too, but if you are in New England you will have to wait for better weather!
http://carolynstearnsstoryteller.blogspot.com/2013/05/chalk-up-student-fairy-tales.html




 

Chalk Up Student Fairy Tales

         What do kids know and understand of fairy tales? How do they interpret them? I, as a storyteller, was wondering and used sidewalk chalk as a way to begin exploration of the questions.

     I work in an after school program and thought the kids would enjoy a spring afternoon with sidewalk chalk. I began by  reminding them of our visit to a local art gallery. I pointed out how each piece of art had its own space and people walked by admiring them. I proposed we make a fairy tale art gallery on the front sidewalk for the parents to look at when they came for pick up.

        Sidewalks are broken by distinct cracks, this sure makes building a student art gallery easy! Each of the kids was assigned a segment of our walkway.  I said our art show subject was fairy tales they could draw a picture from any fairy tale they wanted, I then gave the example Cinderella or The Little Mermaid.

     Right from the example we have Cinderella in her beautiful gown and wearing the crown. Two of three step sisters are present but not as glamorous at all. The third step sister fell off the curb, I was told this! ( I titled the art for them so we could read it)  At 7 years old this young lady was focused on interpreting the happily ever after part of the story.

   This little lady, just 6 years old depicted the Little Mermaid, again straight from  my examples. She had many questions as to the requirements of the art before beginning to draw. I told them this was to be their art, anything they wanted to show from the story, no rules except stay in their square and physically on the sidewalk. The Little Mermaid is swimming into the cave in her picture. She chose to show a part that scares her, we talked about this and what made it scary, it was not knowing the outcome.

      I love this one, it has a special meaning. This young lady was 8 years old. She chose the 3 Little Pigs to draw. In this scene they are dancing, the wolf is gone. I asked why she liked this story and was told, "because the third pig is smart, he built a brick house". I know this represents safety to this little girl - all the buildings in this housing project where they live are BRICK!

      A 6 year old boy drew this rendition of the Little Red Hen. He is a very physical boy, in constant motion as he drew. The blue spirals were her fields and the pink is Mrs. Hen herself. He commented he wasn't good at chickens - he didn't know any! This tied in nicely with all the garden work we have been doing.

        This artist was 8 years old and chose Robin Hood to depict. I did  not go into the difference between fairly tale, folk tale and legend, I wanted them to have a totally positive experience and for me to leave it as much to their interpretation as possible.  Robin is drawn with a crown, I'm not sure that he would like to be part of the royal family but I believe her interpretation was of power and good. I am most interested in her using the form of a snake as the image for the "bad guy".  The evil serpent certainly has a frown, Robin isn't happy he is fighting for his money I was informed.

      This student is 9 years old. I thought it very interesting that she did not pick a particular story but singled out the common character from  many stories. In her words "they all have a mean guy". This was also her writing, it's boldness certainly showing some of the strength of the character. She laughed and commented he wouldn't be a mean guy when it rained.  What power it is to show what is scary and know it would be gone the next morning!

       This use of fairy tales was a fun project the children enjoyed and were proud of. They were very excited to show family members at pick up time. There was much more excitement over this art, than art on paper, I believe because it was so public a space. This few minutes of sidewalk time was a window into their world. Fairy Tales have a place in children's learning to give voice and interpretation of feelings that are complex. They have the power to give hope and wipe out evil with a single rain storm! This day at our after school was a happily ever afternoon!