Llewellyn Elementary’s student voyagers hold ‘Sailing Day’

Published 12:00 am Friday, March 31, 2017

Taking a break from books and computers at Llewellyn Elementary School on Friday, February 24, the fifth grade students “set sail” on a global exploration during this year’s “Sailing Day”.

“This is our second year holding this activity, to wrap up the ‘Explorer Unit’ for two fifth grade classes,” explained teacher Madeline Mininger. “We studied explorers who found North America and South America. Each of the students has studied an individual explorer; and now, during this culminating activity for the teaching unit, they’re teaming up to share their knowledge with one another — to complete a scavenger hunt in the school and around the campus.”

By a random drawing the students were recruited to crew an imaginary “ship”, and sail among stations at the school where their knowledge was tested.

“We learned facts about the explorers and the places they visited, and wrote the information down on cards. Now, the sailors are coming together, trying to answer questions about the explorers during our scavenger hunt,” Llewellyn fifth-grader Avery said, as she went to join her shipmates aboard the Magnificent Neptune.

Some of the stations to which the “ships” sailed were “matching” games; one was a “cake walk” quiz; and Mininger held a Jeopardy-styled game in her classroom. For the ships to advance to the next port, the student sailors needed to pool their knowledge to answer the questions.

As the adventure unfolded, Mininger smiled and said, “I like seeing them all work together, as they remember what they learned about the explorers.”