Remembering Chile

We packed up all of our many beautiful Chilean artifacts provided by Lua Siegel and asked the children what they recalled about our unit on Chile. This is what they had to say:
Raine - the collapsed mine and the 33 miners emerging safely
Alleck - the clock made of copper and lapis lazuli
Alleck - the blue-painted porcelain dove decorated with painted feathers
Ezra - the money from Chile in the drawer of the wicker cabinet
Doni - the guanacos in the mountains and the penguins in the polar regions
Eliason - how the Mapuches and the Spaniards divided territory
Raine - the Mapuches chased away the Spanish
Madison - the Spanish captured Lautaro, but he escaped
Hazel - the lapis necklace
Raine - the desert is very hot
Clare - the desert animals look for food at night
Eliason - the miners were trapped under the desert
Shealyn - it was hot underground for the miners

Chile was certainly a very rich unit. Sweden promises to be wonderful, too, although we lack artifacts to show the kids. We will probably emphasize Sweden's Viking history, their current social structure, the indigenous Sami people of the north and the glories of snow, snow, snow. We are already counting to ten in Swedish, singing a song in Swedish that is all about how frogs have no ears nor tails and we are singing a beautiful song in English for Santa Lucia Day. The relevant art activities that Leslie has created for us will keep the classroom feeling festive right up to Winter Break!

Best regards,
Doni

Learning About the Mapuches

We have been learning about some of the indigenous peoples of Chile. We are focusing on the Mapuches, but there were and are also the Picunche and Moluche people, too. This morning, with the whole group present, we learned that the Inca empire once attempted to conquer the Mapuches, but were defeated. The Mapuches built a network of forts for defense which came in very handy when the Spanish later attempted to conquer them as well. They too, were defeated. Then the Mapuches and the Spanish lived in relative harmony, side by side for 300 years. There was trade between the groups and each benefited from the relationship. The Mapuches, for example, adopted horseback riding and the raising of sheep and wheat. The Spanish learned metalworking skills from the Mapuches.

In the afternoon, with the older kids, I went on to tell them about the series of treaties between the Mapuches and the Spaniards and how they, little by little, granted more and more power to Spain. Spain conquered the Picunche and Moluche territories and eventually absorbed the Mapuches as well. Next week we will learn about the civil war that divided Chile between independentists and royalists and the Chilean War of Independence which resulted in a free and independent Chile. Today, Chile enjoys one of the highest standards of living in South America and it is one of the most politically stable countries on the continent.

Best Regards,
Doni