A Unit Study on the Ancient Celts
Objective:
We continue my daughter's requested tour of the ancient world, this time into the world of the Celts. This was a fun diversion from the paths typically taken by schools, but there was a challenge finding age appropriate books to read along. We chose to study this in March, to tie in with St. Patrick's Day. While exploring the ancient world, we wanted to examine some myths, and learn about some of their contributions to science, math and the arts. I create daily worksheets dealing with the days topic and a daily chore. My daughter gets five or six questions while my son gets three or four. If there is room, I may include some math (simple equations or word problems) or language arts questions (like rhyme, syllables, synonyms).
Spelling List and Sentence of the Week for K/1st grader:
Language Arts lessons include some simple questions about the spelling list, like finding the nouns, making rhymes or counting syllables. We read and write our sentence of the week every weekday.
Spelling Words - Green, Luck, Fairy, Ireland, Giant, Rhyme, Gold, Bee, Tree, Leaf
Finn was a giant.
Fairies are tricky.
We continue my daughter's requested tour of the ancient world, this time into the world of the Celts. This was a fun diversion from the paths typically taken by schools, but there was a challenge finding age appropriate books to read along. We chose to study this in March, to tie in with St. Patrick's Day. While exploring the ancient world, we wanted to examine some myths, and learn about some of their contributions to science, math and the arts. I create daily worksheets dealing with the days topic and a daily chore. My daughter gets five or six questions while my son gets three or four. If there is room, I may include some math (simple equations or word problems) or language arts questions (like rhyme, syllables, synonyms).
Spelling List and Sentence of the Week for K/1st grader:
Language Arts lessons include some simple questions about the spelling list, like finding the nouns, making rhymes or counting syllables. We read and write our sentence of the week every weekday.
Spelling Words - Green, Luck, Fairy, Ireland, Giant, Rhyme, Gold, Bee, Tree, Leaf
Finn was a giant.
Fairies are tricky.
Gold is at the end of the rainbow.
Jamie is lazy.
Myths:
Every week we read a myth and did an activity based around the myth. Most of our readings came from Celtic Mythology by Geddes and Grosset and The Book of Fairy and Folk Tales compiled by W.B. Yeats.
We started with a favorite - Fin M'Coul by Tomie dePaola. This is a highly entertaining story about how Fin's wife Oona outsmarted Cuchulain, who had been terrorizing the giants of the land.
After this familiar tale, we moved onto the Irish origin story. Much like Zeus chased away the Titans, the goddess Danu was not the beginning. Before her arrival, there were the race of Partholon and Nemedh who battled the Fomorii. The Fir Bholgs arrived, traveling through Iberia. These are the peoples encountered by the Tuatha de Danaan. After the origin story, we moved onto two classic stories of love and loyalty - Tristan and the Iseult and the Legends of King Arthur.
Math:
At least once a week, our math activities would tie in with a different theme from ancient Celts. The story of Fin M'Coul tied in with our first math lesson. If you've ever been to Ireland, there is a great national trust site called Giant's Causeway. This is the bridge that Fin was working on in the story. The amazing thing about this site is the hexagonal columns. These basalt columns are actually the result of volcanic activity long ago, but they inspired us to make some shape art and draw our own hexagons. We like the Melissa and Doug magnet pattern block set, because you can create the included images or use the blank magnet board to create your own designs.
The Celts worked in metal, and practiced mixing different metals with different properties. Rather than work with metal ourselves, we spent some time sorting materials by attributes like soft and hard, bendable, ability to float, and how well they hold heat. Combining metals also involves measuring and balance, so it was a great chance to play in the water with some measuring cups, comparing volume. We also pulled out our scale balance and practiced finding a balance with different types of items.
We practiced a little engineering after looking at some of the man-made islands the Celts would create. We have an area in the backyard where the kids have built a bit of an indentation to hold water. So the kids made a tiny island in their "pond." We tested how well they designed the island by adding water and watching it erode.
As with many other ancient civilizations, the Celts studied the stars and moon to track the progression of time. We got a blank calendar to fill in to continue our studies of time.
Art:
Our first art project was a status symbol worn by the Celts. We looked at various torc designs. Torcs could be worn as a bracelet, arm band, or necklace. Many designs involved twisting or rotating the metalwork. We had a collection of various green and gold pipe cleaners the kids enjoyed twisting together to make their own torcs.
We looked at the beautiful illuminated manuscripts, like the Book of Kells, created on the island of Iona. We practiced making a few extra large letters and filling them in with lots of detailing to create our own illuminated manuscript.
For the week of St. Patrick's day, we enjoyed lots of rainbow play in art and science. Michaels inspired us to create a salt rainbow. We used glue to create the base of our picture. We sprinkled salt on top of the glue. Then we painted over the salt using liquid watercolor. It was fun watching the salt absorb the liquid. If you are using a regular kids watercolor set, make sure to use plenty of water to wet the color.
As we are getting more sunny days, we decided to make some "stained glass" and looked at some of the Celtic influenced designs in stained glass. We noted the Celtic knot, interlinking designs, and the natural influence in the work. We cut a few pieces of clear contact paper, big enough that we could fold them over the design. Then we cut some pieces of tissue paper to create our work, carefully placing them on one half of the contact paper. When we finished, we folded it up and taped it to our windows so that we could watch the sun shine through.
Science:
We started our science talking about the Celts love of nature. So our first week, we started two longer experiments and an observation set. First, we started some seeds in a plastic bag with a wet paper towel so that we could watch the seed start. Our second experiment was a study in evaporation. The Hallstatt Celts were salt miners. They realized they could dissolve the salt from the mine in water and then use the sun to evaporate the water. So we created a salt water solution and allowed the sun to evaporate our solution. Finally, we tried to check on the moon at least twice a week, to observe the changes.
The Celts did not like to write anything about themselves down, for fear that their enemies might learn about them. But they did have a system of writing, called Ogham, based on leaves but written as a series of dashes. They included many different types of leaves in their system, so we started collecting leaves that fell from the trees as we walked. When we got home, we tried to identify some of these leaves. We read the books Leaves! Leaves! Leaves! and Seeds! Seeds! Seeds! by Nancy Elizabeth Wallace to help us with identification.
For Saint Patrick's Day, we played with rainbows. We pulled out our prisms and tested them around the house, finding the best spots. We wore our diffraction glasses. We looked at the back of CDs and played with a sprinkler. We also created a rainbow spinner. We colored a white circle of cardboard with the colors of the rainbow in pie pieces. In the center, we poked with a pencil and taped it in place with the tip pointed through the other end. Like spinning a top, we spun the circle and watched the colors blur back to almost white. We made a smaller version to go on top of the spinning motor we got with a Magic School Bus Kit.
Miscellany:
During the month of March, we had several other themes to study - Dr. Seuss for Read Across America, math on Pi day, germs as the US started shutting down due to Covid-19, and dinosaurs per my kids requests. So we spent our miscellany day covering those topics instead.
But we did do a lot of St. Patrick's Day inspired reading to share. We read Tomie dePaola's biography of St. Patrick. A favorite about family heirlooms, moving, and the Chicago fire is Fiona's Lace by Patricia Polacco. The Jamie O'Rourke books by Tomie dePoala are another favorite, in part because I can't help but read them in an accent. Too Many Leprechauns is a fun story about outsmarting leprechauns and why they keep their gold at the end of the rainbow. The Leprechaun in the Basement is a story of financial hardship and understanding. The Woman who Flummoxed the Fairies is the story of a baker who was kidnapped by the fairies for her cakes, but outsmarted them and won her freedom.
Myths:
Every week we read a myth and did an activity based around the myth. Most of our readings came from Celtic Mythology by Geddes and Grosset and The Book of Fairy and Folk Tales compiled by W.B. Yeats.
We started with a favorite - Fin M'Coul by Tomie dePaola. This is a highly entertaining story about how Fin's wife Oona outsmarted Cuchulain, who had been terrorizing the giants of the land.
After this familiar tale, we moved onto the Irish origin story. Much like Zeus chased away the Titans, the goddess Danu was not the beginning. Before her arrival, there were the race of Partholon and Nemedh who battled the Fomorii. The Fir Bholgs arrived, traveling through Iberia. These are the peoples encountered by the Tuatha de Danaan. After the origin story, we moved onto two classic stories of love and loyalty - Tristan and the Iseult and the Legends of King Arthur.
Math:
At least once a week, our math activities would tie in with a different theme from ancient Celts. The story of Fin M'Coul tied in with our first math lesson. If you've ever been to Ireland, there is a great national trust site called Giant's Causeway. This is the bridge that Fin was working on in the story. The amazing thing about this site is the hexagonal columns. These basalt columns are actually the result of volcanic activity long ago, but they inspired us to make some shape art and draw our own hexagons. We like the Melissa and Doug magnet pattern block set, because you can create the included images or use the blank magnet board to create your own designs.
The Celts worked in metal, and practiced mixing different metals with different properties. Rather than work with metal ourselves, we spent some time sorting materials by attributes like soft and hard, bendable, ability to float, and how well they hold heat. Combining metals also involves measuring and balance, so it was a great chance to play in the water with some measuring cups, comparing volume. We also pulled out our scale balance and practiced finding a balance with different types of items.
We practiced a little engineering after looking at some of the man-made islands the Celts would create. We have an area in the backyard where the kids have built a bit of an indentation to hold water. So the kids made a tiny island in their "pond." We tested how well they designed the island by adding water and watching it erode.
As with many other ancient civilizations, the Celts studied the stars and moon to track the progression of time. We got a blank calendar to fill in to continue our studies of time.
Art:
Our first art project was a status symbol worn by the Celts. We looked at various torc designs. Torcs could be worn as a bracelet, arm band, or necklace. Many designs involved twisting or rotating the metalwork. We had a collection of various green and gold pipe cleaners the kids enjoyed twisting together to make their own torcs.
We looked at the beautiful illuminated manuscripts, like the Book of Kells, created on the island of Iona. We practiced making a few extra large letters and filling them in with lots of detailing to create our own illuminated manuscript.
For the week of St. Patrick's day, we enjoyed lots of rainbow play in art and science. Michaels inspired us to create a salt rainbow. We used glue to create the base of our picture. We sprinkled salt on top of the glue. Then we painted over the salt using liquid watercolor. It was fun watching the salt absorb the liquid. If you are using a regular kids watercolor set, make sure to use plenty of water to wet the color.
As we are getting more sunny days, we decided to make some "stained glass" and looked at some of the Celtic influenced designs in stained glass. We noted the Celtic knot, interlinking designs, and the natural influence in the work. We cut a few pieces of clear contact paper, big enough that we could fold them over the design. Then we cut some pieces of tissue paper to create our work, carefully placing them on one half of the contact paper. When we finished, we folded it up and taped it to our windows so that we could watch the sun shine through.
Science:
We started our science talking about the Celts love of nature. So our first week, we started two longer experiments and an observation set. First, we started some seeds in a plastic bag with a wet paper towel so that we could watch the seed start. Our second experiment was a study in evaporation. The Hallstatt Celts were salt miners. They realized they could dissolve the salt from the mine in water and then use the sun to evaporate the water. So we created a salt water solution and allowed the sun to evaporate our solution. Finally, we tried to check on the moon at least twice a week, to observe the changes.
The Celts did not like to write anything about themselves down, for fear that their enemies might learn about them. But they did have a system of writing, called Ogham, based on leaves but written as a series of dashes. They included many different types of leaves in their system, so we started collecting leaves that fell from the trees as we walked. When we got home, we tried to identify some of these leaves. We read the books Leaves! Leaves! Leaves! and Seeds! Seeds! Seeds! by Nancy Elizabeth Wallace to help us with identification.
For Saint Patrick's Day, we played with rainbows. We pulled out our prisms and tested them around the house, finding the best spots. We wore our diffraction glasses. We looked at the back of CDs and played with a sprinkler. We also created a rainbow spinner. We colored a white circle of cardboard with the colors of the rainbow in pie pieces. In the center, we poked with a pencil and taped it in place with the tip pointed through the other end. Like spinning a top, we spun the circle and watched the colors blur back to almost white. We made a smaller version to go on top of the spinning motor we got with a Magic School Bus Kit.
Miscellany:
During the month of March, we had several other themes to study - Dr. Seuss for Read Across America, math on Pi day, germs as the US started shutting down due to Covid-19, and dinosaurs per my kids requests. So we spent our miscellany day covering those topics instead.
But we did do a lot of St. Patrick's Day inspired reading to share. We read Tomie dePaola's biography of St. Patrick. A favorite about family heirlooms, moving, and the Chicago fire is Fiona's Lace by Patricia Polacco. The Jamie O'Rourke books by Tomie dePoala are another favorite, in part because I can't help but read them in an accent. Too Many Leprechauns is a fun story about outsmarting leprechauns and why they keep their gold at the end of the rainbow. The Leprechaun in the Basement is a story of financial hardship and understanding. The Woman who Flummoxed the Fairies is the story of a baker who was kidnapped by the fairies for her cakes, but outsmarted them and won her freedom.
Oh my goodness. This makes me miss teaching about the Celts. Great job. I hope the kids enjoyed it.
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