This time they are shaping paddles in Mr. Roblin's Class
Posted Jun 17, 2010 By Margaret Knott
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EMC Lifestyle- First it was the hiking sticks crafted by Mr. Roblin's eager Grade 4 and 5 students at Marysville public school, followed up by a trip to Frontenac Park that drew me to the school .
Mr. Roblin's grade 4 class at Marysville Public School hold up the paddles they decorated.
This time it was the paddles completed by this same class of 18 young students that brought me back to Mr. Roblin's classroom where an array of nature paintings lined the room and a Bono Echo Park brochure was on every desk
I encountered the same enthusiasm in their welcome, the same eager faces, all ready to tell me how the shiny, decorated paddles hanging side by side had come to be.
Mr. Roblin told me at the outset that that the children used a Spokeshave, (a word Mitchell spelled in a big voice) an old style wheelwrights tool used, to shape the purchased wood paddle blanks. Mary talked about the sandpaper (40 to 80 up to 220) used "for a long time" to smooth the paddles. The sanding went from the lowest number with the most grit to the largest with the least, according to Axl.
After a first coat of varnish each child designed and painted a picture on one side of their paddle and an identifier on the other side, (all different) followed by the required three or four more coats of varnish. "They have put a lot of work into this project, so what happens now," Roblin asked, encouraging an answer.
"The class will be going to a year end camping trip to Bon Echo Park where we will use our paddles," Eric said. "We are planning what to pack, what to bring and what food to take," according to Axl. "Half the class will canoe and swim , then have a scavenger hunt, (using a map to learn the layout of the park) a campfire sleep and the next day the other half will canoe and swim before we go home, " he said. "We will go on the Mugwump boat to the Rock and climb. " "Where there are aboriginal pictographs," another voice piped in.
" They have been reading from the Bon Echo tabloids that cover everything from endangered species to recycling, about nature, the peregrine falcon, the ancient trees on the rock, to the animals they might see," Roblin said.
Language came in the form of reading, spelling and use of many difficult words underlined in the tabloids. Decades ... superlatives.. interpretive.... Yurt (they have all seen the yurt on the island).
The students will also write about something they see on their park visit, and submit a poem about the trip to the Bon Echo annual contest . Mr. Roblin said that his students viewed many 1920's Group of Seven paintings. "Their paintings, hand-crafted paddles with pictures on both sides are the Group of Eighteen," he concluded
"So how do you rate this unit of learning," I asked the children after taking their picture before leaving.
Summing it up one student said : "It's a 9 right now, and it will be a 10 when we get back from Bon Echo Park. Mr. Roblin's the best," said another.
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