Field Trip to The Scrap Box on January 7

Last Friday we went to The Scrap Box for a fun learning adventure. I love this place - what an amazing resource right here in Ann Arbor. If you've never been, I highly recommend it. I hear they do a great birthday party, too!

Our guide, who shall remain nameless

We went with Elaine's class, and met with a young man (I've already forgotten his name, unfortunately) who told us about what The Scrap Box does. Lots of big manufacturing places make things that create a lot of leftovers. Normally, these leftovers (or scraps) would be tossed away. But instead, they give these scraps to The Scrap Box who in turn sells them to crafters, teachers, and anyone else who might find a use for them.

Arvid creates a puppet
Then we went to the craft room, where we saw some examples of puppets made from scraps. Tubes were shown to be very useful, as these can make the puppets walk! We spent about an hour there, in a busy hub of creativity. 

What personality!

The shopping area

The last part of the trip was very fun - each child received a small shopping bag and we went to the HUGE shopping area. The students filled each bag with foamy pieces, sticky-backed pieces, tubes and other things. We even found doll heads! You never know what you are going to find there.

After we got back to school, the puppet making frenzy continued. Students were encouraged to create a puppet with real personality, and to decide on an appropriate name and voice. Each child then got the opportunity to introduce their puppet to the rest of the class.