Culture in a Can

Bedtime (and homework time) has been a zoobilee zoo for the last couple of weeks around these parts.  Something has been happening every night, right around 6 PM, that causes Alex and Jane to explode into a whirling dervish of giggles and silliness and uncooperativeness.  In writing that out, it makes it seem a lot more adorable than it actually is.  But rest assured that it is NOT.  Adorable that is.  Aggravating, yes.  And super challenging to get Jane to just sit down and focus on her weekly homework packet.  And for the past couple of weeks, she's had the added assignment of a research project to work on for their unit on cultures at school.  They were able to choose any country they wanted to find out information on various aspects of their culture, and then write up a report, color in a paper doll to represent the clothing of that country, make a flag, and fill a can with items to represent the country.  

 {I bubble-lettered out "THAILAND" on the construction paper to cover the can, and Jane colored it in to look like the Thai flag.}

Oh Jane.

Jane took the easy way out by choosing Thailand -- where Scott served a mission many moons ago -- and had his help over the weekend with filling out the research rubric.  I managed to finally wrangle her down this evening before dinner to make her sit down and actually write the "report" {and I use that term VERY loosely}, and helped her cover her "can" {a rubbermaid flour canister that we emptied for the occasion} with construction paper and fill it with her items.  Her treasures included some Muy Thai boxing shorts, baht (Thai money), an old train ticket stub, a small stuffed elephant, a baggie of rice, and a small photo album with pictures of Thailand from Scott's mission.

 A Thai girl.  ;)

Thai money and a train ticket.

I think she had a lot of fun with the project and thankfully, it didn't take NEARLY as much time and effort to get her to finish up this evening as I thought it would.  So I'll take it!  Hahaha.  I'll close with a "Multicultural Report" on Thailand by Jane...

This is about Thailand.  Asia is really hot, sometimes it is cold.  Here are some foods they eat rice, vegetables, chicken, and pork.  Many people are buddhist.  They wai instead of shaking hands.  Waing is something you bow when your hands are in front of you.  Here are some popular sports in Thailand soccer, takraw, dancing, and volleyball.  Some clothing they wear is skirts, dresses, and chut thai.  There are more than 8,000,000 people in Bangkok, Thailand.  Thailand is very different than the U.S.S  Some things are similar.