Crafts for Learning about Castles

We have been studying castles and medieval times for a few days and my boys are just loving this unit.  We have been reading books, watching movies, and enjoying a few hands- on crafts and lessons.



Ian spent a bit of time on the Lego Castle Adventure website reading all about medieval castles and creating his own coat of arms.
  
Evan also went on the Lego Castle site and with my help was able to earn a few trophies for his room.

He made a coat of arms and it was neat to hear his logic for all the things he picked:

  • He made his shield a diamond shape because he figured it would offer the most protection.  
  • He picked the colors blue and yellow because they are his favorite.  
  • He made the Falcon (bird) in the middle a deep red to match the trim he had chosen.  
We read about castle jobs and took a little quiz.  He kept getting one or two wrong and in order to get the trophy you had to get them all right.  He got frustrated and quit and I couldn't blame him.

We moved over to the Medieval Times site and looked at some of the weapons of the time period.

Then he asked me to print out a coat of arms for him to color.   

They all seem pretty caught up in the coat of arms so I thought I'd let them each make one out of cardboard next week and they can paint & decorate it.


In furthering our medieval study we read Smelly Old History Medieveal Muck and the boys were asked to draw, paint, or create in 3- D their own castle.


We studied pictures of castles found on the Internet and I showed them some art samples I had found on pinterest the other day.  I then left them to create.

They all thought play- d'oh would be the best choice (I was surprised and thought Ian at least would want Lego's) but we pulled out the jars and I left them to it.  Here's what they came up with so far:




Ian's castle may be a bit hard to see on the mat but he included window holes, drawbridge, and the center keep

Alec's castle is two floors with mote and parapets.


For history we read a book called Knights and Castles and made our own mini bow and arrows using Popsicle sticks, dental floss and q- tips.

If you follow this link you'll find the directions.  It was pretty simple and lots of fun!  I'm sure I'll be finding q-tips around for quite some time but that's OK.   They set up a castle out of soft blocks and tried to knock it over.  

They realized it took quite a lot of coordination and concentration to get the bow and arrow to work right.  It was a bit hard to use since it was so small and your fingers have a tendency to get in the way.



Linking Up With:






Homeschool Coffee Break

CCBG-PartyLogo


Comments

  1. Lisa HealyAugust 31, 2017 at 10:40 AM

    That Smelly Old History book looks fun!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Linda SAugust 31, 2017 at 8:24 PM

    kids and castles - can't help but have fun AND learn some things along the way! Looks like some memorable education happening there.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Kym ThorpeSeptember 5, 2017 at 8:22 AM

    Very fun! My kids enjoyed medieval themed crafts and activities when they were younger.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Mother of 3September 5, 2017 at 7:08 PM

      I think there is something so fascinating about castles and knights that just draws kids in.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Favorite TV Shows Growing Up in the 80's and early 90's

Image
Do you remember the TGIF lineups on Friday nights? I can remember planning sleepovers and time with friends around TV Show lineups of our favorite shows... or else trying to set the VCR to record our favorite shows if we weren't going to be home. And through the years I had SO MANY favorites! Growing pains aired in 1985 which put me around age 8 and it stayed on the air until I was 15 or so; I'm pretty sure most people in my age group watched mostly for Kirk Cameron and all his antics.  I still have a soft spot for family sit-coms!  The Facts of Life aired when I was just 2  and stayed on the air until I was 11 so I'm sure the episodes I remember so fondly were either some of the later ones and then reruns shown later on when I was old enough to watch from the beginning. I think everyone would have loved an Edna Garret in their lives.   Benson another sitcom that began airing when I was just 2 and was done by the time I was 9 (another one I must have watched mai...
Read more

Things That Make Me Laugh

Image
I loved the challenge of this week's list for our 26 lists link up.  I don't know about you but I really need to laugh more lately.  It's such a great stress reliever. 1.  Books-- I love a good funny book that makes me laugh out loud.  I haven't read one in a while but if you have any recommendations I'm all ears.  The last book I can remember making me laugh was the Un-Honeymooners. 2  The boys being silly. 3.  Watching shows like America's Funniest Videos or Family Feud. 4. My husband.  Most people don't realize it but he's actually pretty funny and often makes me laugh. 5.  Whenever my sisters/ family get together and we get to reminiscing (particularly if my Aunt Elaine is around) we end up laughing so hard at all the old family stories that we are all in tears by the end of the night.  It's fabulous. 6. Movies like Mom's Night Out, Christmas Vacation, and Grown Ups make me laugh out loud. 7.  When my ...
Read more

Making Gift Card and Money Holders Using Scrapbooking and Cardmaking Supples

Image
I don't tend to keep a lot of crafting supplies on hand so when I saw this month's de-stash challenge I wasn't sure what I was going to make.  I finally realized that with so many of my Christmas gifts being cash and gift cards this year that I needed to make up some fun paper crafting/ creative ways to gift them.   I still want my nieces and nephews to have something to open so I pulled out my papers and stamps and made up some cute little money/gift card holders. They were much easier to make than I thought.  The first one I worked on was to hold some oversized Nintendo gift cards.  I made a standard sized card and folded down one corner of the card front.  Then I ran my double sided tape along the bottom an 1/2 way up the side creating a cute little pocket.  Finally I added some cute embellishments and ribbons.   Voila! A simple and easy gift card holder for those larger sized gift cards.  The bulk of the tweens and teens on my list j...
Read more

Dollar Store Candy Cane Wreath

Image
Today I am linking up with some fellow bloggers for a Dollar Store craft challenge.  I don't often participate in these challenges since I try to stay away from our local Dollar Stores; I find they can be quite dangerous for me!  I knew this was the perfect time to find some inexpensive holiday decorations though and I just LOVE how my wreath turned out!  I hope you stop by and see what the other hosts are sharing. Meet this month's co-hosts! Across the Blvd | Purple Hues & Me This Autoimmune Life | Our Unschooling Journey Domestic Deadline | Sew Crafty Crochet Stone Cottage Adventures | Sum of Their Stories | Two Chicks & a Mom I bought the candy cane wreath base and a few rolls of mesh (not knowing how many I'd need I bought waaay to many; I only ended up using one white roll and one red roll. Using some chenille stems I already had on hand I attached the mesh to the wreath base trying to alternate the whit...
Read more

Making a Sugar Cookie "Gingerbread" House

Image
 Alec really wanted to try making his own gingerbread house this year without using a premade kit.  We talked about how we never really eat the house since they don't taste very good.  Years ago we gave up on the frosting that comes in the kit and began making our own so we thought perhaps we should try making our our house too. Only problem is that no one in the house likes gingerbread.  We talked about trying to make the house using a sugar cookie recipe.  Alec was so excited at that idea since he just LOVES sugar cookies.   He found a recipe online for a simple sugar cookie recipe and mixed up the dough.  He rolled it out an cut it to the size of our cookie sheets-- we had read that it's easiest to cut the house pieces out after the dough has been baked and is still warm and soft because then you don't have to worry about any of the pieces losing their shape while baking. I had picked out a simple cookie cutter set on Amazon and as soon as the ...
Read more