January 25, 2012
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Story of the World - Chapter Eighteen
———– Crete-ings from the Minoans! ———-
(((Giggles)))
Isn’t that punny?Yes. Well. Anyhow… ahem.Sometimes? He just works these things out. Because this week’s art study in our schoolroom is “Landscape with the Fall if Icharus”. By Bruegel… you can see it HERE. Who (ironically) we got to see a work of at the Art Museum this weekend, and I also stopped and got a book called ‘Gods & Men’ so we could read about Icharus… because up until now, I have avoided mythology. But it’s about time to start thinking of it, as we’re wrapping up a unit study in our nature notebooks, and astronomy is coming up. And then, on top of all THAT, we’ve hit the Myth countries in SotW… just in time!
So we visited Crete and learn about the world’s first navy (which RunOfTheMill built out of milk carton bottoms(?) HERE), about the volcano on a nearby isle that erupted and ashed over Crete, corrupting the air and land to the point where the civilization ended with the leaving of all the peoples (which Satori Smiles simulated with a plaster of paris erupting volcano HERE).
But the story everyone loved the best about Crete was Theseus and the Minotaur… the Minotaur on Crete was fed seven boys and seven girls from Athens every year – down in a labyrinth under the Castle at Crete. Theseus (son of Athen’s king) journeys to Crete, and with the help of Princess Ariadne, uses a ball of yarn to find his way thru the
labyrinth (and out again) and slays the monster!BOTH of my SotW sites also built labyrinths (HERE and HERE). Satori used LEGOs, but they’re tiny… y’know? So we got out the Du-PLOs, and I set Daddy and the kids to work building a labyrinth. ((I wanted our BeanieBaby Bison in the center, but he’s apparently gone walkabout… so we settled for a lion.)) It… was an unmitigated disaster. Nobody knew what they were doing, and nothing led anywhere… it was a mess. I guess too many cooks in the kitchen, r’something?
So I put the kids to bed and set about building a labyrinth FOR them. I lined up four Little People, and got it all ready. Brian thought I’d gone mental, sitting on the floor surrounded by blocks, humming a jaunty little song. But there weren’t any little hands to mess it up, so it was the perfect time for it! Here’s the finished project – can YOU find your way through it?
Then this morning, I got the kids out of bed one by one (oldest to youngest, to preserve the maze as best as I could). Each child got a Little People, and had to find their way through the maze. It was a good maze, too… every one of the boys went the wrong way, and had to back-track. Ethan made three wrong turns, and Isaac two… Aaron was completely flummoxed! But Lydia got it with just a little concentration. Which means it was a GOOD maze! And they loved the surprise of having something special to wake up to and an ‘adventure’ to take on their own MORE than they liked trying to build the sucker the night before!!
Tonight Brian wants to watch ‘Labyrinth‘ with them,
so I’ll probably cave and go along with it. ((grins))
Other SotW Lesson Eighteen Sites:
Comments (4)
That’s awesome!
What a fantastic way to start the day! Looks like FUN – and it took me 3 tires to find my way thru it.
That is awesome, Anna! What a great maze and idea!
As I was reading this my two oldest boys were nearby oogling your lego maze lol….I let them see all the pictures and now they are running off to get the legos out and try it out for themselves… this is a GREAT idea!
btw, “Labyrinth” was one of my fav movies as a kid!