Thursday, February 24, 2011

Landing and Launching: Installment 17

38 Creatures of the Deep

Preparation time: Fifteen minutes
Materials: One of the following:
(1)   Cards with images of sea creatures
(2)   Props of sea creatures
(3)   A collection of shells
(4)   This list with associations:
l  Shark: Hunters, some endangered now
l  Whale: Actually a mammal, loves to sing
l  Starfish: Clingy
l  Seahorse: Magical
l  Seal: Fun loving
l  Sea Lion: Fierce sometime lazy
l  Walrus: Wise and somber
l  Salmon: Feeds the people
l  Clams: Likes to hide
l  Oysters: Home of pearls (pearls of wisdom)
l  Crab: Eats just about anything, has a fierce pinch
l  Lobsters: Tasty! Also has a fierce pinch
l  Sand dollars
l  Kelp: Capable of incredible growth (three feet in a day!)
Procedure:

39 Planet 

Preparation time: 15 minutes
Materials:

(1)   Write the name of each planet on an old tennis ball or other similarly sized ball.
(2)   If you are feeling creative do a little research and color the balls to match each planet.
(3)   If you are feeling more precise find a variety of balls that match the proportions of each planet.
The list is included here for your convenience.
(1)   Earth: Safe for human and other life
(2)   Venus: The Goddess of love and passion, female aspect
(3)   Mars: God of war but also protection. Male aspect, also of course home of the martians who are always invading us and have hence become part of the mythology of popular culture
(4)   Saturn: God of agriculture
(5)   Pluto: God of the underworld
(6)   Uranus: father of Saturn and the grandfather of Jupiter
(7)  Mercury: The messenger
(8)   Jupiter: Head dude
(9)   Neptune: God of the deep
(10)                       Sun: The center,  source of life for earth
Procedure:
(1)   Give a brief explanation of the mythological meanings of the name of each planet
(2)   If you are fortunate enough to be outside spread the balls out in order across a large area.
(3)   Allow participants to wander and sit by the planet they feel most closely attracted to.
(4)   Ask participants to bring their planet back to the circle.
(5)   Each participant in turn shares why they feel like that particular planet.
(6)   If you are inside use the general procedure and place the balls in the center of a circle
Alternatives:
(1)   To save time cut and paste images of the planets onto cards.
(2)   To save time just verbalize the above list with brief descriptions of each.
(3)   Since Pluto has been demoted you may be able to find a solar system model in the science room (remember that thing you used to play with while the science teacher lectured?). You may be able to use this temporarily or even permanently.
Notes:
Although science has deemed that there are now only 8 planets I have chosen to disregard this advance in knowledge. There is far too much rich mythology from multiple cultures to simply throw away. A quick search of the internet will reveal that every ancient culture had meanings and interpretations of the planets. Western mythology  has been infused with the Greek and Roman assignations but you may want to offer other cultural interpretations of planet lore. Some of the more interesting are the stories from India and Africa.


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