When students returned to school from the winter break, they discovered that they would be visiting several foreign countries for their geography class. Needless to say, everyone’s mood was more than excited! We prepared applications for passports and then Mother Melanie made pictures of the students to send to the passport authorities.
Two days later, the students received their passports and visas for China. Yes! China will be our first country to visit. We checked the airline companies and found the schedule of flights that would suit our needs and then figured the number of miles that we would travel while on our journey. We then divided the cost of the ticket by the number of miles we would travel to find out how much the each mile would cost. We figured the number of time lines we would cross and the approximate number of hours we would spend traveling.
On Wednesday January 15th, we boarded the plane, handed our tickets to the hostess and settled back for a long, long journey. While traveling all the student spent time mapping the important rivers, cities, mountains and yes, the Great Wall of China. We learned that there are around 1.7 billion people living in China and that most of that population lives along the eastern coastline of the country. While on the plane, each student designed Chinese outfits for our paper dolls who are traveling with us. Each day a different student dresses our paper dolls in a new outfit. The colors and designs are bright and delightful. We have begun studying the past history and the different dynasties that have ruled China. We may be visiting some of the devotees who live here in Mainland China very soon.
Our future studies will include learning about the government, economy, culture, arts, education, climate and natural resources, topography, ways of life, food choices, recreation, holidays and much much more. At the close of our journey, each student will be writing a country report about China. We will be making crafts native to China, learning to eat with chop-sticks and hopefully, we will have a guest come and share information about China with us.
And guess what! When we finish our stay in China, we will be going to another country! We haven’t decided which one yet. but we will let you know just as soon as the decision is made. Sure wish that all of you could come with us. We are having such a good time here in China.
