PHASE ONE

 Capitalizing on children’s interests in boats, I shared a story about my own daughter’s   experience - a “boat without water”.  The children empathized and related to the story, and wanted to share their own stories too.  Ferry rides, fishing trips, camping adventures and boat stories were shared orally. Everyone wanted to share their stories so while interest was high the children had the opportunity to portray their experiences and knowledge of a boat through a media of their choice. Choices included labeled pictures, writing, drawing, lego, blocks, clay sculpting, and painting.

The children's use of media to represent their knowledge was as varied as the children themselves. One child chose to draw a detailed picture and wrote a story about it. Another chose to create a detailed diagram and labeled it. Another student folded boats out of paper in a variety of sizes, and taught other children how to make them.  Some children sculpted out of clay and others out of lego, while others decided to draw. One little girl went right to measuring. She wanted to find out how big a boat would need to be if we were all to fit in it. She took pieces of paper in a variety of sizes and measured how much space each person took up and laid out a diagram on the classroom floor. She decided we would need to move some furniture in the classroom if we were going to build a boat in the classroom.

During the preliminary investigation it became clear that the children had some rudimentary knowledge about boats but also some misconceptions.  For example, the boats from lego were only representative of the top half of the boat, not considering the submerged hull of the boat. The children had little knowledge about how boats were propelled through water or what materials could be used to build the boat. The children were able to list many different kinds of boats, but they wanted to know more about naming the parts of a boat.

  A letter was sent home in the children's weekly communication books introducing the project and inviting parents to contribute in any way they could. In the days that followed children shared more personal stories, brought pictures from home, asked questions, and wondered about boats. The children’s interest in boats was captivated and they were constantly on the look out for materials and information related to boats.  For example, during daily library book exchanges, different children would find books and pictures to create a classroom displays.  The children took ownership for creating a display in part of the classroom.  They started bringing toy boats from home, a parent even lent the classroom some of his model boats.  Children went home and began asking their parents about their boat experiences, and some parents came into the classroom to share their stories, experiences and adventures related to boats; everything from the tall ship festival in Scotland, house boating, fishing tales, ships in bottles, and the building of boats.

The children were intrigued with the idea of building a ship in a bottle. One of the boys in the class who is a reluctant reader was determined to find out how this was done. He kept searching books, pictures and experimenting until one day triumphantly he shared his findings with the class.

The children’s questions and wonderings were recorded on charts to guide further exploration.  Over a period of days many questions were compiled; Following are some examples of the original questions and wonderings the children had: