Sixth Grade English Students Build Reed Boats

by Hilary Hersh

Reading, writing, grammar, vocabulary, and .........  boatbuilding?  

You heard right. Recently, sixth graders in both classes built model reed boats like the ones the main character constructs in the book they've been reading: A Long Walk to Water by Linda Sue Park. In the book, the character, Salva Dut, and the group of Sudanese refugees he was traveling with, needed to build boats to cross the Nile River and make it to a refugee camp in Ethiopia. 

After reading a description of the process in the book and watching some videos of boatbuilders, the students were ready to try it themselves.  Their challenge was to figure out how to build a boat using just a few available materials: straws, corn husks, straw, string, and tape. 
            
Working alone or in partners, the students spent their class time assembling boats and then tested the buoyancy of their creations in a large bin of water.  Result: Success. 
            
Afterward, the students reflected on how they worked through the challenge and how it brought them just a bit closer to understanding Salva's experience.
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