Ancient Mesopotamia: Babylon, Ur, Sumer, Assyria

 

We did a few fun projects that went with these civilizations. Some came from books we checked out from the library, others I found online. Some are pinned on this Pinterest board: https://www.pinterest.com/marilynnielson/ancient-civilizations-homeschool-unit/

We made and played "The Royal Game of Ur." (I like how Daisy credited "the City 'Ur'" for making it up.)

We watched this slightly weird video from the curator of the British Museum https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XVmsfL5LG90 

and then did cuneiform writing in homemade play-dough:

(Gussie's cuneiform was rather…finger-shaped)

My favorite craft this unit was these "Hanging Gardens of Babylon." I found the idea in this post here, but it doesn't really take much explanation. We (and by "we" I mean just the children; I didn't help them) just took dry floral foam blocks and carved windows and arches out of them with butter knives and skewers. Then they painted them with a mixture of tan paint and a few tablespoons of sand, to make them look like bricks or stone. 

After the children had put their "buildings" out to dry outside, Ziggy came running inside all excited to tell me something. "I did a ac-tivity! I made some beautiful gardens! Come and see!" He had taken the bunches of flowers and stuck them nicely into the buildings, and he was so proud! Luckily they could be pulled out again so the other children could finish their projects.

They added water with blue paint (and Daisy and Teddy put clear plastic wrap on first, to look more like dripping waterfalls), and then stuck pieces of plastic plants and flowers inside the foam to complete their gardens!

I thought they both (Daisy's and Teddy's gardens, and Junie and Goldie's gardens) turned out so pretty! We kept them as centerpieces on the table for a long time, and they looked great!

Lots of people think the Hanging Gardens of Babylon weren't real, but I hope they were! I like imagining what they might have looked like.

Making Mini Zen Gardens

I have always loved Japanese gardens of all kinds. I love the green, lush, mossy ones; and the restrained, dry, gravel ones; and the ones full of bridges and trees. I was inspired by mini Zen gardens I saw online—these and these—and I knew this would be a great project to do. (The Zen gardens are named for Zen Buddhism; contemplating the carefully raked gravel is supposed to assist in meditation and clarity. But not all dry landscape gardens have to be "Zen" gardens; we just called them that because that's how they're popularly known.)

There are some beautiful garden designs here that we used for inspiration. We also had several books with gorgeous pictures of all kinds of Japanese gardens. I wish we had one of these for our yard. :)

Making our mini gardens was really simple. We just poured white sand into shallow containers; any kind we could find. We used a couple pie pans and a candle tray and a ceramic baking dish and a tiny roll basket-warmer. Then we hunted for lovely and interesting rocks to include.

That reminds me of a funny story: once Sam and I were visiting a Japanese garden in Portland (or was it San Francisco? I'm not sure). One of the workers there came up and started telling us about the Japanese landscape architect who had designed the garden. He said, "The architect even had these rocks brought in specially from Japan. He said that in the United States, there were 'no rocks of sufficient age and character.'"

The guy (the tour guide, and I guess the architect too) was so proud of those ancient and venerable Japanese rocks. And they were lovely. But…afterwards, Sam and I just laughed and laughed at the "sufficient age and character" thing. As if there aren't any ancient rocks in the U.S. just because it's a relatively new country. And geologically, Japan is a much more "young" and volatile country! That architect must not have ever heard of these rocks, to name just one group that is of quite "sufficient age." Ha ha.

Anyway, we didn't worry too much about "age and character," but just tried to find rocks we liked. :) I used some from the beach in Oregon. We placed our rocks carefully (trying to pay attention to areas of rest and detail like Sam taught us) and then raked lines in the land. Some of the children added little "trees" or greenery as well.

It seemed like it would be fun to have natural-looking wooden rakes like they use in real, non-mini gardens. We saw these cute handmade wooden rakes, so we made a few of these of our own. We loved how they looked, and they made nice wide lines in the sand. For smaller, finer lines, a regular fork worked quite well too!

Daisy's was the tiniest garden. So cute!

It was really fun to experiment with different rock arrangements and raking patterns. This garden Sebby made is SO peaceful and simple. I love it.

This was raked with a fork. Then we rearranged it…

and raked with our little homemade rake.

That looked pretty, too!

We absolutely love our mini Zen gardens and we still have one on our kitchen table. It is very calming to sit and rake patterns in the sand. We can see why Japanese monks enjoy it too! :)

Japanese Garden at the International Peace Gardens

Under the red torii gate

We've visited Japanese Gardens in Denver, Portland, and San Francisco, but I was hoping we could find some kind of Japanese garden around here to visit during our unit. I came across some Yelp reviews for the International Peace Gardens, which included a Japanese garden, so I looked up their website and found it here. Based on the reviews, I wasn't expecting anything too great. People said the gardens were pretty, but kind of neglected. Still, I thought they would be worth a visit.

When we got there we were pleasantly surprised! Yes, there are a few aspects of the gardens that haven't been kept up: some of the ponds are empty, and not all the beds are as well-tended as they might have been when this place was new. But it was so lovely, in spite of that! The Japanese garden was one of our favorite sections, but there are gardens from countries all over the world. The children loved running around and exploring them all! It's a great place to come on a nice Spring day. We would love to go back again, maybe with a picnic this time. We were so glad we found out about this place!

Japanese flag above the Japanese garden

It has all the elements of a traditional Japanese garden. Graceful arched bridges (painted the lucky color red)—

Stone lanterns (this one would have been on a little island in the pond, if there had been water in the pond). Daisy found this little branch and was holding it up all day and calling it her little "bonsai," in case you're wondering what she's got there.

Nicely-shaped trees. And this looked like it might once have been a little waterfall. It would be so fun to see this place with all the water features!

Another stone lantern

Abe and Goldie on the bridge

Another small red bridge, by a clump of pretty Japanese iris

And Junie found this lovely Juniper tree.

Each garden section in this park is fairly small, but the whole park covers quite a big area. Then there is an even bigger park, with playground equipment and skateboarding ramps, etc., surrounding the International Peace Gardens. It was so nice to walk around and see everything. I'll show pictures from the rest of the garden, even though they aren't really related to this Japan Unit, just because everything was so beautiful.

Switzerland's garden. Don't you love the Materhorn there?

There was a cute miniature Swiss chalet below the mountain.

This was Mexico, I think. The girls thought this big head was hilarious, for some reason.

The Chinese Garden had a couple nice pagodas, and some cool stone lion statues.

There was water in this pool!

The French garden

Greece's garden

I love this covered arbor walkway! I assume it was for Denmark, because at the end of the walkway was…

The Little Mermaid, just like the one in Copenhagen Harbor!

Daisy and Junie liked her. We wished she had some water to sit in!

The children were playing all sorts of games up by this Stonehenge-y sort of rock installation. I think they were pretending to be trains?

The International Peace Garden is a beautiful place to visit. We recommend it!