Ancient Egypt

We're working on a project on Ancient Egypt in the Open School. I'm constantly amazed by the responses of these kids. Especially since the only exposure they have to this stuff is from school. No Discovery Channel programs, no picture books at home, no discussing it with their parents... the only input they get is from school. But they absorb information like a sponge and even though they're just 8 or 9 years old, they're already learning to think about what they learn and ask intelligent questions.

And as for creativity! We're making Egyptian style jewelery among many other things; and I taught them to make simple, round papier mache beads. Then I got them to work together to make more of the same. The next time I looked, they'd produced round, oval, oblong and even star-shaped beads! (I'll try to put up a picture tomorrow.)

We plan to present our project on Parents' Day and the kids are going to dress up like the Ancient Egyptians and wear the jewellery they've made and talk about what they've learnt. Needless to say, we're all looking forward to it!

Update: I'd completely forgotten all about the photographs for this. Sorry for the looooong delay, but anyway, here's a link: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.486680480024.253281.663025024&type=1&l=50d23e044a

The Open School Project

Little Flower Open School started in 2007 with one student, which quickly became... 2 students -- at least that year. We wanted a school where children learnt how to work hard, but enjoy it. In the last three years, we have been slowly but surely getting more students, and now we have a grand total of 23! Okay, I know it's not much compared to the BIG schools, but we're getting there. And now that we have a larger number of kids to work with, I've decided to try and write about my experiences in the Open School. I don't know how regularly I'll be able to do this (in between research for the latest project and planning class activities!) but I'll write as much as I can.