On Wednesday Emma had a choice to do her homeshool (story about that later) or finish up her Hogwarts journal. I was sure she'd choose the journal, but no, she said she wanted to do homeschool. I was surprised. When asked why she wanted to, her answer was she was kind of hoping she'd get a "Howler." Now Ron was mortified when he got his, but I guess Emma isn't as easily mortified.
Well, she got her wish. Hogwarts sent her not one, but two, Howlers by muggle email. Well, she got right to her journal and completed it :D.
Emma got here sixth letter from Hogwarts on Friday. Well, she actually didn't get a physical letter.
Apparently the owl, Ron's family owl Errol, fell into the Great Salt Lake as he was delivering the letter to Emma in Provo Utah. Alas, Hogwarts had to send the letter by muggle email and the complained of the imposition it was, but had to get communication to Emma somehow.
This letter had two lessons and a task.
The first lesson was in Muggle Studies. Emma was to watch a play at the Shakespeare Festival in Cedar City Utah. She was to watch "Fiddler on the Roof." After watching the play she was to dictate to Papa was it was about in the journal. Emma did so the next morning. She wrote (by way of Papa) that the play was about "Love" and how a family with 5 daughters had three daughters their papa did not want to marry the men they wanted to. The first fat daughter (Emma's description, not mine) wanted to marry her friend, the papa wanted her marry the man he picked out. He let her. The second daughter wanted to marry a man who "went to jail" and the papa didn't want her too, but she did and he was good about it. The third daughter wanted to marry a man who was not from the same place they were. He was not happy about it. The family and neighbors believed in God and were Jewish. At the end of the play the bad people made the Jewish people leave because they wanted the land and things in their part of town. The Jewish people went to San Francisco (not sure where she got that from the play :) and different parts of America and other places.
So, she's learned about the Mexican-Spanish settlers of California and the Catholic missions and now about Jewish immigrants to the US a couple hundred years later.
And that is the play ;).
The second lesson was in Magical Creatures. Emma was to go to a National Park called Zion. There she was to find out if seashells could be found up in this area and why (In her first lesson she learned about the different types of creatures with seashells). We didnt' find any seashells, but Emma did ask a ranger and they said though there are no seashells here, there are fossils of seashells here. Perhaps someday we can go fossil hunting, but at least we know there are seashells from long long ago here. Later when I asked Emma why she thought there might be seashells up this high in the canyons, her answer was matter-of-fact and kind of "you should know this papa" tone... "Because there was once an ocean here." I will have to show her that she is indeed right.
She was also to take photos and draw a picture of her favorite canyon area. Hogwarts sent here colored pencils and a magic 'wand' that could change the pencil drawings to look like paintings. She was to look at several paintings of canyons and landscape by Georgia O'Keefe and then draw a 'painting' of Zion canyon in a similar imaginative style. She hasn't done that yet, but we'll post a photo when she does.
The task was to get a small vile of red sand from Zion canyon. This sand would be used in the potion. Task completed.
Photos to be posted soon.
Previous installments of Hogwart's Summer School of Witchcraft and Wizardry:
Hogwarts I: the first letter and Mexico
Hogwarts II: Back in San Francisco
Comments (2)
I am so interested in how you did this! how were you able to set it all up?
Comment #155498 on July 7, 2008 12:30 PM |
Well, it's all from my head with a little help from materials.
I bought parchment paper and envelopes, wax, wax seals from Nostalgic Impressions: http://www.nostalgicimpressions.com/
I then put together the lessons based on the places we are traveling to/living in this summer (Utah, Mexico, San Francisco, Provincetown MA, Germany, England). The lessons are Muggle Studies and Care of Magical Creatures. The themes I settled on were migrations of human populations (Mexican settlement of California, Jewish immigration to US, Mormon trek to Utah, Pilgrims settlement of America, etc) for Muggle Studies and the wide range of salt-water creatures from mollusks to crustaceans to mammals for Care of Magical Creatures. There are a few other lessons in art (focusing on the paintings of Georgia O'Keefe and the plays of Shakespeare) and maybe a couple others.
Each lesson has her writing or drawing in her journal and reading.
I address the labels like they are in the book (Emma, in bright colored room...) and we just lay them near a window or have someone do it for us.
I've also got 'rewards' and items she gets along the way like Bernie Bott's Every Flavor Beans (I'll write more about that soon), a model of a snitch, the magic pencil to paint 'wand' (I found in an art store), etc that I get from the harry potter store (http://harrypotter.wbshop.com/) or I'm making.
For example, at the end she'll receive a "Marauder's Map" of all the migrations she's learned about (and more, including our ancestors) that I'll make to look like the one in the movie (to an extent).
The last task is to take all the items she's collected and the journal to King's Cross Station where she will be met by someone we are recruiting to act as a Wizard to accept the items and the journal. In return she'll get her own wand!
They'll return the journal after studying it. And return the items she's collected for the potion (that will be mounted in a shadow box) to remind her of her trips this summer.
It's a work in progress though. I'm trying to think of some things to do that are a bit adventurous or to recruit people (like we did in the restaurant) to make it a bit more well..'adventurous'.
Comment #155500 on July 7, 2008 2:16 PM |