Posts Tagged ‘history’

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LEGO Civil War

Thursday, July 2nd, 2015

lego-civil-war-hospital

When you study the Civil War, you can re-create different scenes with LEGO. One of the best ways to use LEGO in studying the Civil War is to use the LEGO people as soldiers to re-enact the battles. If you join many green LEGO bases together, you could even make the terrain–the rivers, mountains, valleys, and trees–to make the battles look more authentic.

Ideas for LEGO Civil War Scenes

Besides the obvious battle strategies and tactics for the Civil War, you can also re-create the following scenes:

  • Create a LEGO Civil War hospital. Put a red cross into a white wall as you build the hospital, and make sure you have plenty of beds where soldiers have amputated legs and arms. Civil War soldiers notoriously had body parts amputated needlessly because of lack of hygiene.
  • Build a Civil War camp with white tents and campfires and soldiers milling about.
  • Re-enact the Underground Railroad in LEGO. Have LEGO men trying to escape from cruel slave masters and flee to Canada with the help of friendly homes along the way.
  • Sew a miniature hoop skirt for a LEGO person. Add a parasol by using a small paper umbrella from a party supply store.

lego-civil-war-battle

In these ways, you can bring to life this time period and internalize the Civil War while having fun with LEGOs!

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Posted in History | 2 Comments »

LEGO Castle

Monday, April 20th, 2015

LEGO-castle

My 11-year-old son Nathaniel built a castle out of regular LEGOs. You really don’t need to get an expensive castle kit; if you have regular LEGO bricks, you can build a LEGO castle of any shape and size as you study the Middle Ages.

lego-castle-base

Start with a green base. Find all the white LEGO pieces and dump them in a pile so that you don’t have to keep looking for more pieces while you build. Decide what shape you want the castle to be, and outline it on the LEGO base. Make sure you leave space for the entrance. For our castle, we have four castle keeps, one at each corner.

build-a-lego-castle

Start building up the walls, interlocking the LEGOs and staggering them so that the structure is sound. If you put a LEGO brick connecting two LEGO bricks, the structure is less likely to break apart. You can insert a design on the front with a different color, either in a shield shape or any other shape. The entrance can be made either as a rectangle or an arch. My son decided to make an arch with pillars on either side.

LEGO-castle-2

Keep building up the structure until you run out of white LEGOs. Then enjoy your LEGO castle!

For more hands-on activities for the Middle Ages, take a look at my Medieval Unit Study Pinterest board.

 

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Posted in History | 7 Comments »

LEGO Ancient Egypt

Monday, March 30th, 2015

lego-ancient-egyptMy daughter constructed a LEGO Ancient Egypt, with the Nile River flowing over the hot sand overlooking a pyramid and the Sphinx. We used regular LEGO bricks, so anyone can do this.

You start with a LEGO base. Create the Nile River by collecting blue LEGOs and making the river flow from one end of the base to the other. Don’t forget to form the Nile River Delta on the north side of the base. A delta is a place where a river splits up into rivulets. You can place some palm trees along the river if you have them.

lego-egyptNext you will want to make a pyramid. We chose white LEGOs, building them up into a step-like pyramid. If you want to make three smaller pyramids, you could do that instead of making the larger one.

The Sphinx was made out of yellow LEGOs, with two thin yellow LEGOs as the legs. Two regular LEGOs form the body, with a half LEGO for the head. Simple.

lego-ancient-egypt-2Now pour sand over the whole thing, making sure to leave a little bit of green on either side of the Nile River, because the land next to the river is green compared to the desert further from the river.

If you look at the LEGO Ancient Egypt from the top, you will notice that it looks like a map. You can have your children draw a map of the scene for practice in map-making skills.

Here are some more Ancient Egypt Unit Study ideas:

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LEGO White House

Monday, February 9th, 2015

lego-white-houseMy kids made a LEGO White House when we studied the Presidents of the United States. We made it out of regular LEGO’s. First we read a book about the White House, where all the Presidents have resided since John Adams.Then one of my sons wanted to make a model of it with LEGO’s.

We looked at the outer shape of the White House. Using white LEGO bricks, we made four columns and then a triangle shape at the top for the front of the White House. This area is separated from the main residence, as you can see from the top picture.

lego-white-house-2We made a rectangular building out of white bricks, with a door on the front and the two sides. Then we studied the different rooms in the White House, and so we covered the floor of the White House with different-colored bricks for each room. The Red Room, for example, was red. In this way, we were able to make a replica of a White House out of LEGO’s.

If you enjoyed this post on how to make a LEGO White House, you might like the LEGO Bacteria and the LEGO Tower of Babel!

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Posted in History | 6 Comments »

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