Art: Greek Story Vases

Today we did a fun art project that mimics some of the pottery from Ancient Greece. I found the project Here. At some point during the creation, John's dinosaur cup came to life and he chased everyone around with it :).

A word of warning: Oil pastels do not wash out easily, I have had the best luck with formula 409 as a pre-treater. Even then, it doesn't always come out.

First we printed out these pages. The kids drew the story they wanted to tell and some patterns onto the paper. Then we transferred it onto the Styrofoam cups and completed the activity by adding the oil pastels.

The Minoan Eruption of Thera

Today we used baking soda and vinegar to mimic the eruption of Thera that we read about in our history curriculum. The kids just loved this. Even after everyone had a turn, they continued blowing up the volcano for about an hour afterward.

If you were interested, we got the volcano from Lakeshore learning store.

Ancient Greece: Kick off Olympics :)

We invited some friends and had an awesome Ancient Greek Olympics. Each olympian received a laurel crown and a medal for their efforts. For a craft they made the little olympic torches. (If you would like to make one to click here).

We had a long jump, relay races, chariot races (with each kid taking a turn being the wheelbarrow/chariot), a javelin throw (the kids made the javelin with straws), a shot put throw (though not historically accurate, it seemed safer than greco-roman wrestling).

This was an awesome way to kick off our Greek unit study. We always love hanging with our homies, but this really created an excitement and enthusiasm for the upcoming academics. As we complete activities I will post them here!