Lowell — Fifth-grader Addie Homolka envisioned what the cabin of an 18th-century American settler, a 13-year-old boy left in the wilderness, looked like while reading “The Sign of the Beaver” in her class at Murray Lake Elementary School.
Using materials at home, she assembled a miniature bunk bed made of sticks, a garden plot of paper corn, a wood chimney and tiny fur rug. She added a bucket for water and extra wood for building fires and little trinkets present in the story.
“It helped me learn more about what it was like back then,” Addie said of making the diorama based on the 1983 children’s historical novel by Elizabeth George Speare, in which the main character, Matt, learns to survive with help from Attean, a Native American boy.
A showcase of “Sign of the Beaver” dioramas was on display during the recent learning fair for parents and visitors. They included log cabins made of pretzels, rocky creek beds, cotton smoke and play animals.
Fifth-grade teacher Matt Jablonski said the ELA project is part of students’ study of historical fiction and done collaboratively with social studies. While reading the book in ELA, students are learning about Western expansion and how settlers interacted with Native Americans.
The diorama is a great way for students to pull details out of the book and demonstrate what they saw in the story, he said.
“Everyone visualizes the story differently and everyone can see the settings differently, so I give some autonomy as to what they saw in their mind and (in) bringing it to life,” Jablonksi said. “Their attention to detail is something that always amazes me.”
Fifth-grader Ollie Weston used popsicle sticks as logs, stones to make a fireplace that he rigged with little lights, and sprigs from pine trees in his own yard.
He said he learned about what a settler’s life was like.
“It helped me think about how little they had back then and how primitive it was. They had (few) items to live with.”
