With summer fast approaching and school being out for a couple of months, here’s your chance to be a kid again, have some fun and learn some new and exciting things along with your grandkids. Here’s how…
After you have read the novel GROUNDED and perused the activity book together, choose the activities that sound most exciting and interesting. (You might choose to take different grandchildren to different activities depending on the age).
* Indicates a more advanced activity.
- Go to St. Jacob’s farmers Market or other large market. Buy some fresh vegetables grown locally like Marie and her mother grew in their farm garden. Prepare the vegetables in your favourite way or try a new recipe.
- Ride the train from the market to St Jacobs or Elmira (or some other local place of interest) just as Ricky rode the train to come for his holiday on the farm.
- Go to a strawberry farm and pick your own
strawberries. Make Dr. Salk’s Favourite Strawberry Pie. (recipe pg. 52 in the activity book.) - Pack a picnic basket and go for a hike, but first, bake some Chocolate Chip Cookies like those Marie and Billy took on their hike. (recipe pg.49 in activity book)
- Make home-made lemonade on the hottest days in August. (recipe pg.51 activity book)
- Go fishing the way Billy and Marie did when they got bored.
- * Learn about Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King from the activity book pages 37& 40. These two influential African-Americans lived during the time of the novel Grounded. Take a road trip to Dresden, Ontario to learn about the earlier days of Black History. Discover important people such as Josiah Henson.
- * Watch the movie Invictus and learn how Nelson Mandela used sport to overcome racial tension. Talk about why his plan worked.
- Go to the CNE (The Canadian National Exhibition), which was the huge treat for the children at the end of the story.
- Letters were an important way of communicating during the time of this story as there were no computers. Write a letter to your grandparents thanking them for your Summer Adventure. I would love to get an email from each of you, too. (Grandparents included).
Novel is available at Wordsworth Bookstore, Waterloo, Ontario
Novel and activity book are available at Bookshelf Cafe, Guelph, Ontario and Roxanne’s Reflections Bookstore, Fergus, Ontario.