Thursday, May 5, 2011

A long time ago in a galaxy not so far away…. Star Wars Unit Study

Inspiration comes from the strangest places.  This week is the last week of the Pacific Science Center’s Star Wars exhibit.  We are HUGE Star Wars fans.  I should say Don is a huge Star Wars fan and my children have all followed suit.  I like it, but wouldn’t say I am as into it as they are.

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So we go to the Science Center, and I am thrilled to watch the butterflies hatch and play with all of the other spaces… my kids and husband are dragging me to the Star Wars area.  But once I got in there I have to say I was completely inspired!  There were tables of robotics, presentations on costuming, videos on planetary conditions, and real life holographic and hovercraft.  It was quite inspiring!

We spent about an hour at the table with the robotics.  The goal was to build a robot that would go over various terrain and then turn, and finally go forward enough after turning to get into this box that says “finish!” 

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I came home with so many ideas on how to do a unit study on Star Wars that I decided right then and there we were going to spend our whole school week (with Don’s schedule that is Fri – Mon) studying all things Star Wars!

The only thing I couldn’t figure out is how my kids were going to keep up on the things they were working on in for writing… then I had a brainstorm idea!  Story Starters!!!  I wrote some up and now my unit study is complete.  The story starters are as follows… stay tuned for more over the next four days.  It should be a BLAST!

 

Star Wars Story starters (language arts)

1. You wake up and you realize you have a robotic hand. How does it feel to have a robotic hand? As you lay in your hospital bed being looked over by your medical droids, things start to come back to you slowly. Who are you and how did you lose your human hand?

2. Your mom and you are moving to the planet of Hoth. You don’t want to go but are trying to make the best of it. Your mom says you can bring one pet. What would it be? What supplies would you need to move it to Hoth? What would happen if I changed Hoth to Endor? How would it be different? This one includes a bit of Science as well, feel free to study the different habitats that are similar on our planet to the conditions of these Star Wars places:

a. Hoth = Antarctica

b. Endor = Northern CA Forest

3. It is your first class at the Jedi League. Your professor is Master Yoda. You walk in and there are two questions floating on the holo-board… The first one is “Your deepest fear, your worst enemy, it will be. What be yours?” What is the second question? How do you answer them?

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