It's not easy bringing a junkyard to the classroom, but we managed! Old bins full of the most intriguing "junk" kept things fairly contained -- and gave lots of inspiration for the robots we made.
We met some intriguing and pesky aliens. The Skeeters were out in full force this week, both the earthly skeeters and the alien ones. We met another group of aliens as well, the clan of the Tartars, named after a Cream of Tartar can from the junkpile. They were refugees from an alien planet, searching for their mother ship.
I can't say much more about this, since I will definitely repeat this adventure in the future. We went off page partway through the week, bringing Jake's Junkyard Tomte into the story -- but it was so rewarding that I may include that part next time. Thank you, OE -- that was a brilliant addition to the story!
We're going to have to make more junkyard Tomtes, and more junkyard robots, so I'm thinking sequel next February or April. This will give the robots we made this week a real workout, too -- we need to explore what they do!
Kids and staff were busy all week, crafting alien robots from old tin cans, pieces of old folding rulers, silverware handles, and parts from antique oil lanterns. Pipecleaners became the fasteners of choice for arms, and collectively we made about twenty five glass eyes. The results were fabulous--the robots may be viewed on the Dragon's Eye Facebook page by clicking this link.
Photos of the adventure may be viewed here.
Thanks, once again, to Oliver Van Soest for working as my assistant this summer. His robot may be viewed along with the ones I made for the story, by visiting this link on my Ravenscrawl Studio page.
A very special thank you goes to Jeremy Tardif. He cut the old folding rulers into arms, and drilled all of the holes in our tin cans.
