Each student chose a musher to follow. This student chose Scott Jonsson.
Third graders work at making “tundra pudding” as part of their Iditarod project.
The Iditarod sled dog race in Alaska is an exciting event to follow each year. Each Indus School third grader became personally involved during March when they picked a musher to follow, tracked their progress (miles done and miles to go), how many dogs each had (mushers drop dogs at checkpoints for various health reasons), and what place they were in. Many students would check on their progress at home, too.
The classroom project began with the history of why there is an Iditarod...the “Great Serum Run.” (No trains could make it to Nome to bring life-saving serum to people who were dying of diphtheria, so they set up a sled dog “tag team” to get the serum to Nome.) They also started the unit by watching a Jeff Corwin episode about Alaska’s wildlife.
In addition to learning about history and geography, students reinforced math skills as they graphed daylight hours, high temperature and low temperature for Birchdale, Anchorage (ceremonial start of the race), and Nome (end of the race) and displayed them for a classroom science fair project.
Another fun activity was following a video blogger as he recorded the mushers for his first Iditarod as a spectator.
Students saw a lot of “behind the scenes” activities and kept up with the videos from Alaska’s KTVA-TV, where they learned about life in various Alaskan villages. Some villages don’t even have WiFi. But the Alaskan kids were outside playing basketball in -15 degree weather.
The classroom watched what it would be like to be a musher from a video of a musher wearing a “Go Pro” camera. Then, they listened to classical music and wrote poetry about dog mushing. They used the first line of a poem by Michele Snyder titled “The Snowy Path.” The rest of the poem was from their imagination. Some samples include:
Gauge Olson -
As I glide along the snowy path I see the beauty of the Alaskan forest.
The beauty glancing upon me and I see the beauty in the majestic bald eagle as it soars across the sky.
I slowly doze off to sleep while the beauty surrounds me... for all of my life I have been waiting for this moment. And nothing is more beautiful than this.
Hattie Ulrich -
As I glide along the snowy path I feel the nice cool breeze on my face. As I glide along the snowy path I know what I’m doing is good and fun.
As I glide along the snowy path I see along the great big mountains and I love it.
As I glide along the snowy path I witness the white and blue still lake and I keep wandering around it.
On my sled with my astonishingly fast dogs all 16 of them.
As I glide along the snowy path I keep going.
Spencer Krueger -
As I glide along the snowy path my dogs are up and ready to go.
As soon as I get on the path I get ready for a bumpy ride.
And I remembered if I got on a snowmobile I’m done for the entire race and leave. And I won’t be able to race.
Reading and language arts were also incorporated into this project in other ways. Third grade teacher Julie Talmage read a book about the Arctic Tundra and talked about “permafrost” before having students make “tundra pudding” from dairy products and cookies. So, when making their individual cups, students added the “permafrost” first, then put the dirt/snow (pudding) on top
The culminating activities related to this project were making a class ABC book about the Iditarod, and watching film footage of the finish while enjoying “puppy chow” at a Red Lantern celebration (the award given to the last musher).
Students all agreed this was a fun (and tasty) way to learn.
