Extension Week: My Family Coat of Arms

My apologies for the late post. This week, we are taking a break from Journeys and will do our first extension activity: a family coat of arms. A long time ago in Medieval Europe, wealthy families that had land were required to fight for their king as knights. These knights would suit up for battle in full armor making it difficult to tell who was who on the battlefield. So knights could know who was friend and who was enemy, they began wearing their family crest, or a symbol that represented their family. These became known as coats of arms and can be seen today all over Europe and even in the US. Think of coats of arms as logos for a family. They are usually simple in design but capture the essence of what the family is.

Students have been working on their own this week to both create a coat of arms for their family and then write about their family in a paragraph that explains why they made the coat of arms the way they did. I am looking forward to seeing our students' coats of arms, as I am sure you will be too. These will be on display for Parent-Teacher Conferences later this month. I will also be sure to post pictures of them when we are done. To see examples of coats of arms used around the world today, see the slideshow below.