THe Very Last First Time

Great title isn't it? It's the title of the book we are rowing this week, five in a rowing that is. Fiveinarow.com Its the literature based homeschool program I'm using with Sophia and Benny. Benny because you can't seperate him from Sophia. He insists on "doing school" with us, which I think is fantastic. Anyway, this story by Jan Andrews and Ian Wallace is about a little Inuit girl who lives near Ungava Bay in Canada. She is allowed, for the first time by herself, to go under the frozen waters of the bay and search for mussels which her family love to eat. She and her mother search for mussels by first shoveling snow away from the frozen bay while the tide is out, carving a hole in the ice, and lowering themselves down the hole. There , at the bottom of the bay, in utter darkness, save a few candles they have brought with them, they search for their mussels! They have to listen for the whooshing sound of the tide coming back in and get out before the waters come. Pretty exciting huh?! So today, I covered the dining room table with white sheets to resemble ice, spread seashells under the frozen bay/dining room table that we collected this summer in much warmer waters than Canada can offer, and set my little explorers off with ice chisels (aka butter knives), mussel pans(aka pie plates) and candles and matches (aka flashlights). They were suited up in their winter finest. Parkas with fake fur hoods, mittens and snow boots. They took their assignment very seriously, and after they had been under the ice for a while, collecting mussels, I began making the whooshing and roaring noise of the tide returning. You would never have known we were pretending the way they scrambled out from under the table, letting their mussels and pans clatter to the floor,as if their lives depended on their speed. It was so cute. But then we had to do it again, and again and again...........
Anyway its a great winter time read with little ones.