Week 6

Happy St. Patty’s day everyone! Thankfully I was not sick this week, so it was back to work as usual.

I took a break from the lesson plans to focus on finding an activity for the kids at Gilbert Christian to do since we will be coming to their school in April. The teachers their said they didn’t want a lesson plan or simulation, but instead something physical they could do at school. My On-Site mentor, Cassandra, also said that she wanted it to be something cheap they could make, costing 25 dollars or below.

With these constraints, I thought of making concrete stepping stones, which I used to do when I was little, because cement mix is really cheap and it's a fun project since you can imprint your handprints and decorate the concrete with marbles or stones. Getting the cement mix is easy and cheap, since each bag is about 4 dollars, however it was the molds that we would pour the cement into that proved to be problematic.

When I made them as a kid, I just bought a cement mold which was about ten dollars, but that would be extremely expensive considering there are sixty kids who would each need their own mold. So I had to find an alternative to buying actual stepping stone molds. The first thing I did was try to find other people's solutions, which mainly seemed to involve buying a concrete form tube (this is basically a giant tube you pour concrete into to make posts) and cutting it up into two inch circular sections which you would pour the concrete into and then leave to dry on a plastic sheet. This would be over 25 dollars though, and require the kids to be in groups of three, so I tried to find another option.

I ended up with two options:

Option #1: Groups of 3 (Some groups of 2)

2 bags of Concrete Mix	$6.50
Concrete Tube Form	$11.52
Plastic Drop Sheets	$4.97
Topping Concrete	$5.97
Total:	$28.96

Other Materials:

Wheelbarrow/Bucket

Trowel/ something to smooth out concrete

Decoration materials

Potential Problems:

Tube form needs to be cut ahead of time

Stepping Stones would need to stay on drop sheets for several days; either staying in same location with a lot of room or cutting up the drop sheets into smaller sections

Kids would have to bring decoration materials

Option #2: Groups of 2 (Some groups of 3)

2 bags of Concrete Mix	$6.50
Plastic Drop Sheets	$4.97
Topping Concrete	$5.97
Decorative Gems	$8.97
Total:	$17.44 or $26.41

Other Materials:

Molds - Kids could bring in cereal boxes

Tape/Scissors - Maybe school could provide? To cut the cereal boxes

Wheelbarrow/Bucket

Trowel/ something to smooth out concrete

Decoration materials

Potential Problems:

Cereal box may get soggy and deform while concrete is drying

Kids would have to bring in cereal boxes and school would have to have tape and scissors

Kids would have to bring in decoration materials or there might not be enough

I talked to Cassandra and we decided that I should try using a cereal box as a mold, and if it worked we would use that method.

So umm tune back next week to find out if it works wow!!