Summer School 2022 Week 4

- August 05, 2022

Week 4's Theme - Fairy

The theme for Week 4 this year was Fairy. This included looking at actual fairies, of course, but also of all things fantasy and magical.

Music - For music during this week the Upper Primary / Middle School worked to create their own pan flutes. This instrument was chosen for its connection to the Greek god Pan who is often depicted playing this instrument. It will take some practice before the music the students produce is magical, but they have their start!

Art - For art the class had two projects. For the first they looked at artwork by Brian Froud and created their own image of fairies based loosely on his work. They then attached wings to the fairies made with paper and clear, colored plastic.

For the second art project the class created dream catchers. These were done mainly with leather and waxed string. Some students attached beads, and some decided to wait and see if they could find feathers anywhere.

PE / Games - For PE the students played a game called Greentoothe Lake. Jenny Greenteeth is an old, not so pleasant fairy that pulls people into swamps. For this game, we started with one student who sat in the middle our gym. All the other students ran across the floor, with the goal of reaching the other end. If Jenny tagged you, you had to join her and help drag in other people. Students could help each other out by linking hands into a chain and trying to rescue those running across.

Board Games - The class played a few different board games based on the fantasy / fairy theme. They played Carcassonne (not pictured), Small World, and Castle Panic. In Carcassonne students competed to see who could get the most points from building walled cities, completing roads, and building churches.

In Small World students used a variety of fantasy races (elves, gnomes, trolls, etc.) to try to take over and invade different areas of land. They had to decide how far to take their invasion, and when they should give up on that race and get a new race. The player with the most money earned after 8 turns was the winner.

In Castle Panic, the students worked as a team to protect their castle as hoards of orcs, trolls, goblins, and other creatures continually pushed forward in an effort to destroy the castle.

English and Math - For English and math, students entered the fantasy city of Abroad Harbor and the surrounding villages.

For math the students looked at one of the villages, Greenbriar, that was concerned about goblin attacks. Students discussed how they could defend the city of farmers. They decided to build a wall and had to do a lot of calculations to figure out the perimeter of the basically circular village, work with fractions and percentage to figure out how many people of the village could actually defend the wall, work out shift schedules, and also how else they could defend the wall and how to do that (like adding spikes to wall, how many, how to get the wood to the city, etc.).

For English the students focused on English conversation and communication. They played a role playing game where they took on the role of a variety of characters who had come to Abroad Harbor to help deal with the goblin menace from the math activity. The heroes included a noble woman, a soldier guarding her, a mercenary, a long bowman, a dwarven merchant, and an elven thief. They worked together and succeeded on their mission (although they nearly lost a couple of the heroes on the way.)