Gingerbread Traps

Kindergarten celebrated the festive December season with a gingerbread theme! All month, students read gingerbread stories and examined the similarities and differences between each text in preparation for writing their own gingerbread stories. Students worked in pairs to design their own traps to catch a gingerbread man, and the unit wrapped up on the last morning before Winter Break as parents joined their students in the classroom to build gingerbread houses together.

In literacy, Kindergarten students enjoyed exploring the similarities and differences in gingerbread man stories from around the world, marveling that there could be so many variations of the same story. Students began with classic Gingerbread Boy and Gingerbread Girl stories and then read versions of the story from different cultural traditions and countries, including The Gingerbread Cowboy by Janet Squires and Runaway Dreidel! by Lesléa Newman. As they listened to variations on the story, the Kindergarteners pointed out the details that were the same in every story and those that weren’t and saw how each author used character and setting variations to put their spin on the classic tale. This exploration of story elements helped students see the importance of character, setting, plot, conflict, and resolution. Students used this experience to create their own unique gingerbread characters, like a gingerbread teacher or a gingerbread fairy, and then crafted their version of a gingerbread tale.

Reading How to Catch a Gingerbread Man by Adam Wallace inspired students to design and build gingerbread man traps. Creativity and Design Teacher Deborah Morrone-Bianco joined the Kindergarten classes to explain the design process. Students started by brainstorming as a group all the elements they could incorporate in a gingerbread trap and then spent time sketching their designs. As the product of pure imagination, the first iterations of their gingerbread traps were in the realm of “fantastical,” notes Kindergarten Teacher Lee Bogaert, but even within those early drafts, there were kernels of a possible design idea. For their second draft, students were assigned to work in pairs and merge their ideas into a single design they would build. They were also encouraged to think about the materials they would have access to and a few design parameters. Each trap needed to be big enough to catch the laser-cut gingerbread man without hurting him and should be able to hold him inside the trap. Students could choose materials from cardboard, foam, tape, pipe cleaners, string, and pom poms. “The goal of this project was to have students practice working together as they brainstorm, combine, and compromise on an idea,” says Deborah. “At this age, that is hard for them!”

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Gingerbread Traps