School Projects!

Zoe has been busy with several school projects over the last month! One involved creating a styrofoam model of the earth, with part of the center cut out, complete with continents, continental plates and movement directions. It took many hours to complete, but she did a great job.

The next project was even more involved. It wasn't overly complicated...just time consuming!! For Social Studies, she was assigned an Egyptian artifact that she needed to re-create. She would also be researching it and writing a speech as an archaeologist to present to the class and parents. Zoe was given the first Egyptian step-pyramid. I think she was pretty lucky, since some of the other choices were going to be a lot more difficult! After searching the town for supplies, and trying to figure out the best way to do this, Zoe decided she really wanted to make it out of plaster of paris to resemble the stone that was actually used. I thought it was a great idea, but had no idea how long of a process it was going to be! So after using one of my baking pans, we mixed endless batches of plaster to pour and set 61 blocks. It took several days, and my kitchen was a complete disaster of plaster, but it turned out pretty neat. Zoe built and glued each level, and then stained it to look more aged.
I'm sure glad this one is finished!

Today was the presentation to the parents. It was neat to see the variety of projects the kids (and parents!) had put together, and listen to their well prepared 3-5 minute speeches! I actually learned quite a bit about ancient Egypt. Zoe is happy that this part is over, and now just has to get through the class presentation to be officially done with this project!