Snapshots from Home: An Impromptu Shark Unit
Lila Armstrong and her two children, aged 5 and 7 years old, from Campbell River, BC, Canada, constructed a shark with Makedo tools and cardboard from their recycling when learning from home. Check out the shark teeth and how they used a greenscreen to get their shark ‘swimming’!
Lila shared the enthusiasm:
"It all started because we found a non-fiction book and watched videos at home about sharks. We are into sharks around here! It got me thinking about making our own 'shark week'. As school closures had just started (and I am a teacher librarian) it seemed like a nice idea to curate resources to help families think about how kids could be learning and having fun at home by sharing what I was doing at home for my own kids.
To get started, I grabbed the small Makedo kit and we headed out to the garage. The boys loved using the tools and being able to see the project take shape. As they added scrus and made cuts, we started to discuss how we might need to make adjustments. Of course, the best part of all was adding all the teeth! After we built the shark, I geeked out and we added a green screen behind the project. The boys moved the shark so it looked like it was swimming and I recorded the clip. The amazing part of the greenscreen was that we had a real ocean background and a big cardboard shark swimming by!"
And then this happened....@Makedo pic.twitter.com/f2laofBO74
— Lila Armstrong (@Lila_TL_EWP)
"Using Makedo is easy and fun. I must admit that I made another animal on my own after we disassembled the shark!
Makedo is a tool that provides children with the opportunity to create anything!
I find that children are often discouraged from building because of safety concerns or because parents don't have appropriate tools or knowledge. Makedo makes it possible for children to be architects, engineers, designers, or just silly kids! My advice is to let the children go and try out some ideas. Then you can ask them questions about their build that might encourage them to make improvements."
Colin, aged 7 years old, says:
"Using Makedo is easy. You don't have to practice before you use it."
