Friday, March 14, 2008

Who lives in an Easter Island Moai under the sea?

Squidward J. Tentacles of course!

Last week when I went to Will Richardson's conference, I left work for my students to complete. They had a reading comprehension packet titled "Ancient Visitors?". The article focused on the strange buildings/drawings of ancient civilizations. I figured this tied in nicely with last month's study of science fiction and this week's focus of distinguishing between facts and opinions. I didn't think much about it and planned to go over it as a class today.

Fast forward to this morning . . .

We are going over the passage, and I am reading it aloud. I'm reading the part about the Easter Island Giants, when a student stops me.

"Ms. Willis, have you ever watched Spongebob Squarepants?"

"Yes, why?"

"Well, those pictures of those statue things, they look a lot like Squidward's house."

I told him that he was right and that it did look like Squidward's house.

Then the assistant principal came in to talk about a fashion show that she's planning. While she was talking I did a Google Image search for a picture to compare it to. I wound up at I actually found a website that talked all about how his house is designed to look like an Easter Island Moai. I couldn't believe that someone did this research and posted it on answers.com but I'm sure glad they did. As silly as it is, because of this person's research I was able to facilitate a connection for my kids.




Will my kids remember where Easter Island is? Probably not.
Will my kids remember what a Moai is? Probably not.
Will my kids remember that Squidward's house is supposed to look like an ancient statue?
DEFINITELY!

2 comments:

Sharon said...

Isn't it funny how you can make connections with the weirdest things??? Kids are good at having open minds and seeing what adults don't because our minds are so cluttered!!!

Adam Dugger said...

I think that is an awesome connection that your students were able to construct! Like you said, the information and the concepts that we explore together might not all stick forever, but that relevance to their own lives.. how rich and how fortunate!

Awesome.
Adam