04 Jul Five in a Row: Lentil

Our most recent Five in a Row book study was the story of Lentil, by Robert McCloskey. This is probably not a book I would have ever picked up at the library. It’s odd title and simple cover belies the amusing story illustrations inside. Lentil is the story of a young boy, growing up in America, who longs for the ability to make music. Like some of us, he wasn’t gifted with the ability to sing or whistle, but he found a way. Using the gift that he discovered he was able to save the day and bring the whole town together.

There were many subjects to cover from this story, so we chose the ones that interested us most from the Five in a Row, Volume 1 manual, and made a few adaptations ourselves.

Social Studies: Geography

Lentil is set in a fictional town in Ohio, so we set out to find this state. The children found it without too much difficulty. We then compared it to where we live and to other spots that we knew, such as the Great Lakes.

We talked about our small town and it’s relation to the state we live in, the country we live in and the planet that we live on. Then we made a simple craft to illustrate the point.

Where I Live Craft

I like this craft because it gives perspective to the child regarding their place in the world. We simply used differently sized bottles and plates to trace increasingly large circles – 6 in total.

We then cut out the circles and attached them together with a fastener so that they can be moved around.

The next step is to label and illustrate the circles from smallest to largest, starting with a picture of the child, followed by My Home, My City, My State, My Country, My Planet.

With Clark and Luci, it’s always a good time to chat while crafting. They’re always happy with a pair of scissors and glue in their hands. So we talked about what it’s like to live in a small town, like Lentil. Our town used to be small but has grown tremendously in the past decade. I grew up in a very small town, so I told them stories about my childhood, which they always love.

Social Studies: History

The book, Lentil, had some very charming illustrations. As part of the history component, we looked through the illustrations to see how people lived in the 1930s, as the book was originally published in 1940. The children noticed the one-room school house, the ornate cash register, the exposed plumbing in Lentil’s bathroom, old-fashioned cars, and even a steam shovel, which they recognized from our Five in a Row study of Mike Mulligan and his Steam Shovel.

Art

We really loved the illustrations in this book. All of the faces, even those of the animals are full of expression and personality. I noticed that the children really picked up on this when doing their drawings. We chose four different expressions – happy, mad, disgusted, and surprised – and tried to illustrate them ourselves. The kids came up with some pretty hilarious drawings.

Science: Taste Buds

For our science, we learned about how we taste food using our taste buds. In the book, an unpleasant man named Sneep causes the band members to pucker their lips, so that they cannot play their instruments. We tried puckering our lips, too.

Remember learning about the tongue mapping theory in elementary school? We decided to challenge the theory by doing our own experiment. Click HERE to read about how we learned to question everything!

Science: Sound and Acoustics

We spent some time learning about music and the science of sound. I blogged about it separately HERE.

Social Studies: Patriotism

In the book, when the town decided to celebrate the return of Colonel Carter, they decked the streets and buildings with flags. We took some time to learn a little about the flag of the United States and to learn about patriotism. We practiced the Pledge of Allegiance together every morning and discussed how fortunate we are to live in the United States of America.

While out grocery shopping, we noticed a recruitment office for the Army and Navy. We talked about the patriotism of our service members, and discussed whether we would want that type of career.

We finished this book study with a bang. I planned that we would finish on the 4th of July, so that we could celebrate big. With some snacks and patriotic music, we went to our favorite, secret spot to watch the 4th of July fireworks in our town.

It was the perfect end to another great Five in a Row book study.