Making a Landform

Kenneth has been assigned the highly educational task of making a landform as part of a larger learning-about-landform-characteristics initiative. I don't have anything against the second phase of the project, but the first phase of actually making a landform is (1) a pain in the rear, (2) time-consuming, (3) expensive to some extent, and (4) of questionable educational value-add. I'm not bitter, but I remember projects like this when I was in school and I never understood the value of making models. Maybe it's just me. Brief sidenote: I remember re-using a model of an English castle that I had to create for SAGE in the 3rd grade again in the 6th grade for a Boston Tea Party project. The fact that the Boston Tea Party had nothing to do with castles was beside the point in my mind. I just didn't want to make a new model. Mr. Wichlep mocked my choice of model with some Lipton tea bags glued to the moat area. I can still remember the disdain in his voice. LOL

Back to Kenneth's project: Like a dutiful Mom, I made the "Landform Dough" which you can then mold into your selected landform shape, which has to dry for 48 hours. The kids were out of school on Friday, so I took the day off with them and most of it was spent locating items that can be added to the landform once it is dry. I have to admit, Kenneth did a great job molding out Florida (we chose Florida, the peninsula, as our landform). We rolled out a map of the U.S., I gave him the lump of landform dough, and told him to make Florida. He even molded out the Florida keys and some internal lakes. Since I am heading out of town on Monday morning, Rod will have to supervise the rest of it (it's due on Friday).

In case you're interested in making your own landform dough (which has the consistency of Playdoh): combine 4 cups flour, 1 cup salt, and 1.5 cups water. Knead together for 8 - 10 minutes.