"100 Waffle Street"... The New and Improved Salt Lake City

In fourth grade, we cover Utah history. One of our main units is all about the Latter-day Saint pioneers that came to settle Utah Valley. One of my favorite activities all year is when we built our own handcart, bring supplies from home, pack it and make our way to the Salt Lake Valley.

The students bring many items that would potentially be packed in a handcart and we weight each item to make sure we don't go over the limit that each pioneer was allowed. Some items were very light and it was difficult to weigh them on my scale, so this student stood on the scale and we had her hold each item to determine the items weight.



Here are two of the boys ready to head to the valley!


The Salt Lake Valley when the pioneers came over, was just that... a valley. So, as a class, we metaphorically took our handcart across the plains and we traveled to the valley to create Salt Lake City. The students learn about the grid system of our roads and have to label them appropriately before we draw out plots of land for each student to build on. Some build homes and gardens, while others set up a grocery store, barber shop or a livery stable.

The day we were trying to label the roads, we were discussing how the temple is the center of the city and then all of the roads are named according to their location from the temple. For example, as you go one block west of the temple, the road is named 100 West. Two blocks east of the temple the street is named 200 East. I was trying to explain this concept to my students. My students often use the phrase "Never Eat Soggy Waffles" to remember which way is North and so forth. So when I asked my students what the street one block west of the temple would be called, one student yelled out "100 Waffle Street!"





We all started laughing hysterically. I decided that as long as the students knew that the REAL name of the street was 100 West, we would add Waffle street as part of the title for our classroom map in honor of this student. (Look closely at the pictures above). He thought it was pretty cool.







I was pretty impressed with how well our city turned out. We are leaving it up for a while. The kids have loved it. They also made mini handcarts that they wanted to park next to their homes and gardens. To finish up the unit, we took a field trip to "This is the Place State Park" where the kids got to pull a real handcart of their own.

Have I ever mentioned that I love my job?!