Back to Mantling (with Bog Babies)

In a similar manner to every other teacher in the country, I have had a strange half term. 

However, it is very good to be teaching and even better to be mantling. I've been juggling two mantles, one with reception children in the mornings and one with year one children in the afternoons. I wasn't planning to do this -  while the intention was always to get the year ones mantling straight away, I was going to wait until the reception children had settled in a bit more before introducing them to the joys of mantle.  However, after a week with said children, I decided what they really needed was Mantle of the Expert. That is why I have spent my half term travelling between dinosaur island and a fictional woodland habitat filled with bog babies*. As it happens, the best part of this half term, reception-teaching wise, has been Mantle of the Expert. This should come as no surprise, of course.

One of my colleagues, having mantled with me for a year now, commented that the bog baby mantle has been her favourite so far. I therefore thought I'd share it and, along the way, think about the tensions and conventions and other things involved. I'm very out of practice with this, so please be patient. 

The team: The Society for the Protection of Bog Babies

The client: Mr Jones from The Milton Keynes Parks Trust

The commission: To confirm whether some creatures spotted in the woods are bog babies and, if they are, to work with the Parks Trust to protect them. 

How the story began (roughly):

• The children learned of the wonder that is 'The Bog Baby' by Jeanne Willis. They created clay bog babies, did some watercolour bog baby art work and soon loved bog babies. We used their work to create a 'bog baby information board' in our classroom.
  
  
• Mr Jones from the Parks Trust came into the classroom, looking at our work and comparing it to photos he had. It turned out the photos had been taken by a member of the public - they showed small, blue creatures in a pond at a local woodland. Mr Jones was looking for the SPBB (The Society for the Protection of Bog Babies) to confirm whether or not these creatures were, in fact, bog babies and, if so, what should be done about them.
  
  
• I wondered aloud whether the children might be able to become the SPBB that Mr Jones was looking for. They agreed and we spent time establishing the team.
  
  
• The team visited the pond to see the creatures for themselves. I had chalked out a pond with lily pads on the front playground. We watched through our binoculars and, as children said 'I can see one!' I invited them to step into the pond to represent the bog babies they could see. Cue lots of giggling and children pretending to suck their toes (a key bog baby trait).

From here, the children wrote a report to Mr Jones confirming the presense of bog babies. The children did some work around habitats and animal categories (they decided bog babies are probably amphibians) and created an information board about them to go in the woods. They created camoflage cameras to capture the bog babies and then had an introduction to stop-motion animation to create some of the footage the cameras captured. 

Unfortunately, one camera captured a bog baby being removed from its habitat. The children quickly got to work to find out who had taken it and to get it back. This involved creating artists' impressions of the culprit and writing persuasive letters to her. Luckily, it worked and the bog baby was returned. 

From here, I had intended to do some work around habitat destruction for human gain (e.g. building houses on the bog baby pond location) but I ran out of time and only briefly touched upon it. 

Conventions (a few examples of how they were used):

1:     The role present: Mr Jones from the Parks Trust, a police officer, a member of 
         a building company and various other adults in role were used. 

2:     The role framed as a film: Mr Jones from the Parks Trust was seen walking
         into the SPBB office and perusing the information on display, comparing                              some images he had in his hand with the images on the board. The children
         understood they could not interact. We stopped and replayed this several 
         times with the children noticing what he held and what he was doing.

9:     A drawing seen in the making: someone had removed a bog baby from
        its habitat. The children watched as an artist's impression of this person
        was created in front of them. 

A useful map:

I've mentioned maps on several (or many) occasions because they are not only interesting but also very useful. 

To build the children's investment in the story, they created their own bog babies and discussed habitats. Then I presented them with a large sugar paper map showing 'the local area' including some ponds and trees. I invited them to decide, if their bog baby was living near by, where abouts it would be. The children placed a pictorial representation of their own bog baby on the map. Later, we used the same map to locate the woodland where the bog babies in the story had been found. Later still, I used it to show where a new housing development would be built - in that same session, the children identified more suitable locations for new housing developments. It was, all in all, a very useful map. 

Over the several mantles I have completed now, I find maps one of the most useful tools. No doubt I will mention them again sometime. 

Best moments:

• Children representing the bog babies they had seen in the pond
• Two children choosing not to represent bog babies in the pond, but staying involved in their own way by watching their class mates and taking notes on what they saw
• One small child, upon learning that the bog baby pond was going to be filled in, saying 'yeah, we don't want them eaten by moles!'
• The children's outrage upon learning that Mr Jones from the Parks Trust had sold land to a housing developer, including the phrase, 'Mr Jones betrayed us!'
• The depth of the children's investment in this particular story

What I'd do differently another time:

I wouldn't introduce the storyline of a bog baby being removed from its habitat. Instead, I would go straight to the 'habitat destruction' storyline as this was supposed to be the main tension. 

It is very good to be mantling again, however rustily. 

* just FYI, bog babies are fictiona.  For a copy of the wonderful book, click here.