Hellobee

In our household, Star Wars has been and continues to be a huge obsession. If I let them, I am pretty sure they would sit and watch Star Wars movies, the Clone wars cartoons, the Lego Star Wars movies and every Star Wars parody ever made all in one day. I would like to say it’s just the kids, but that really isn’t true — Mr. Train and I are also fans and love watching our kids grow to love these movies that were made before even we were born. It seemed natural to include a Star Wars week in our summer plans because I knew we would all have a great time.

My son Joe was desperately waiting for this week. At his school book fair in the spring he picked out a book called Star Wars: Science fair book. Ever since he got it he has been begging for me to do some of the projects. As we read through the different experiments, I realized that a lot of them were a little involved for a 5 year old. I really didn’t want to pick experiments that I would do while they watched; I wanted them to actively participate. I also was trying to find ones that were free or very inexpensive.  So I picked two out of the book and started our week off with some Star Wars Science.

I don’t know if you can tell, but a love of Star Wars runs throughout our entire family.

Day  1

I picked an experiment that makes crystals. The book related it to Star Wars Episode I where they are trying to escape the underwater city and travel through a cave filled with stalactites and stalagmites. So I based the day around that premise.

– Making Crystals – This book used warm water and Epsom salts. The kids had to continue to stir in Epsom salt until the solution could not dissolve any more. This is a super saturated solution and is require to form crystals. After making the solution we placed some string tied to a pencil in our mason jars. The string should give the salt something to attach to as it comes out of solution. The kids made a huge mess all over the table but they had a great time. Each day for a week we went out to check on our crystals  They were a little disappointed because we didn’t get much crystallization, but I cheered them up with a piece of rock candy (perfect crystal examples) to make up for our failed experiment. Next time I just need to make sure their solutions are completely saturated.

Mixing in salt to make our crystal solution

– We looked at pictures of caves and the rock formations inside them on my iPad. I talked to them about stalactites and stalagmites and how they are formed. Nick was enthralled I think he could have looked at those pictures all day.

– I drew a big circle on a paper with the word Stalactites at the top and Stalagmites on the bottom. Then I had them draw their cave in the circle and trace the words. It was interesting to see how they each built their cave. Some were very meticulous about where their rock formations could go and others filled their cave completely  I just love seeing all their differences as we do activities like this.

– We watched Episode I.  They all screamed out, “Mom they’re in the cave! Come look Stalactites!” It just brought a smile to this science teacher’s heart.

Day 2

The second experiment was about walking in sand and being on the desert planet Tatooine.  So I went with a desert theme for the day.

– The experiment was to test what makes walking in sand easier. The set up for this one was fairly easy. I had a dime, a quarter and the top to a mason jar. Each one was placed in our sand box. The kids had to take the end of a pencil and push straight down to see which ones were easier to push into the sand. It gave us the chance to talk about surface area, pressure and how they come into play when walking on the sand. They loved taking the time to play outside in the sand but James did get a little upset when his dime went so far into the sand that he lost it. They were able to tell easily that the larger the object, the harder it was to push into the sand.

– We talked about desert animals and adaptations they might have for living in the desert. I had a picture of a jack rabbit and a bunny and we looked at the differences in body shape, feet size and ear size (bigger ears help regulate body heat better). We also compared the feet of horses and camels  Although my kids knew and recognized pictures of camels, they had never paid much attention to how big their feet are. Joe told me they look like they have big cartoon feet.

– We talked about desert plants and some of their adaptations.  I have some succulents and some aloe in my front yard so I was able to show them how much fluid those plants contain in their leaves and how their leaves feel different than other plants that aren’t meant for the desert.

Day 3

– We went to the library to pick out some Star Wars books.  We have a bunch of early readers and picture books at our house, but I figured we could look at a few new ones for the week. When we got home we read one together about the Clone Wars. I had each kid tell me what the story was about and their favorite part. As my boys are getting ready to start kindergarten, I wanted to work a little on reading comprehension.

– I printed out several pages of a preschool printable pack and put them in plastic covers in a notebook. The kids used dry erase markers on top of the plastic covers so we could do the activities o.ver and over again. We started out with pre- writing activities like drawing different shaped lines across the page

– Then we did some “Read Build Write” activity cards. These are awesome. There is a sheet that has a section marked “read.” The kid picked a Star Wars character card and placed it in that section. Then we used Scrabble tiles to build the name, and they had to write it below. They had such a great time searching for the letters to match the characters. I don’t require them to write perfectly. I just wanted them to try and work on their fine motor skills. Lilly is two years younger so her abilities are different than the boys at 5 years old, but she has a great time trying to match letters and scribble a bit on the page.

Day 4

– We started with another round of Read Build Write. This time James realized if he picked Yoda he wouldn’t have to write as much, so he stuck with that one even though he said he had fun writing Darth Vader the day before.

– We did a counting activity where the kids had to work in pairs and I helped Lilly. They had small paper cut outs of TIE fighters  and the numbers 1-12. They took turns putting however many ships they wanted out on a paper.  The partner then had to count the ships and match it with the corresponding number.  Then they would switch roles so the other had to count and find the appropriate number.

– Pool noodle light saber fights – The kids loved sitting at the table for some “mommy school” time, but they also just need to run and play.  e have had pool noodle light sabers at our house for years. They are super simple to make and don’t hurt nearly as bad when you get smacked with them.  All we did was take a pool noodle, cut them in half and wrap the bases with duct tape and electrical tape to make it look like a handle.

Day 5

– From the preschool pack again each kid made a little TIE fighter book. Each page had a sentence like “The Star Fighter is UNDER the moon” with a picture of a moon on it.  The kids had to cut out little TIE fighters and glue them in the appropriate place.  It had words like next to, over, under, beside. At the end we staple the pages together and the kids had a great time going through their books over and over.

– In the packet there was a letter practice page for Yoda and Darth Vader which the kids had fun doing over and over again.  I think each boy did the whole page about 3 times.

– Puppet show – I took pictures from the printable and cut them out. I covered each one with packing tape because I didn’t want to bother with getting them laminated. We set up some chairs with Stars Wars blankets over them and the kids put on a show for me.  It is always fun to just let them be creative and listen to the things they come up with.

– We had a movie night since it was Friday night.  The kids picked Episode IV and we had a great time watching it as a family.

A few weeks later we took the kids to Legoland as an end of the summer trip. When we got into the Star Wars Lego area, they just went bonkers. I think if there is any obsession in our house that comes close to Star Wars at the moment, it is Legos. So I am sure you can imagine the excitement of Star Wars Legos! Although I can’t quite tell who was more excited — the kids or Mr. Train.  They all went running to the different scenes and could hardly contain themselves.  We had a blast and even got a few Star Wars Lego sets to take home and build. It was a great way to end our summer theme weeks and I know the kids and I enjoyed our summer together before they all head off to school.

Good bye summer and hello Kindergarten