Girls Can Crate is a monthly subscription for children between 5 and 10 years of age that promotes the idea that girls can do whatever they set their minds to. Each month features a different female pioneer whose story inspires girls to achieve. Each box includes a 20-page activity book that includes the heroine’s story, 2-3 STEAM activities, and creative play props. Boxes cost $29.95 each month with themes that celebrate female pioneers from diverse backgrounds, but the activities themselves are usually gender-neutral.
DEAL: Save 15% on your first box! Use coupon code HELLO15.
The box is always full of fun stuff and activities.
The items were cushioned with bright yellow squiggles. Some items were also protected by plastic.
There’s a pamphlet that lists what’s inside the crate. This month, we’re celebrating the life of Ava DuVernay!
Meanwhile, these are pointers for parents on how to “illuminate” untold stories.
Everything in the box!
As always, the box includes a booklet featuring information about this month’s heroine.
At the back of the booklet is a quote from this month’s heroine!
I want more girls to be able to see themselves behind the camera creating images we all enjoy, and I want to call attention to the fact that women directors are here all over the world.
Ava Marie DuVernay, or simply Ava DuVernay, is an American filmmaker. She is also the first black woman to win the directing award in the U.S. dramatic competition at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival. Growing up, she experienced two cities that left a mark on her life. Her mother, a teacher, was from Compton, California, while her father, who is in carpeting business, is from Selma, Alabama. She spent time in both cities growing up, and each told her a different story. In Selma, she learned about the Civil Rights Movement. Seeing life through the lens of these two cities inspired her to become a filmmaker.
She believed that art could help create change and make the world better. After college, she worked as a publicist, and her job is to get people excited about a movie so that the movie will become successful.
There are also illustrations on the booklet that show us Ava! First, she’s on a movie set and behind the camera, and the other one is on the red carpet of the Sundance Film Festival where she won as the Best Director!
Aside from the Sundance Film Festival Award, she is also the first black woman to be nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Director, and the first black female director to have her film nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture. Also in 2017, she was nominated for the Academy Award for the Bext Documentary Feature for her 2016 film entitled 13th.
The booklet included activities to spark a good conversation or storytelling time with the kids! For this one, there are questions and categories where they can start to tell their personal experiences and own stories. The next page has a spot-the-difference activity.
There’s also a Math Race that looks like a film strip and a word search!
In line with the heroine’s achievements, there’s an activity where kids need to complete the Academy Award statue drawing! The next page also has a film strip where the kids can draw a scene or picture of their favorite movie!
The booklet also features another filmmaker, and the founder of the nonprofit Camp Reel Stories, Esther Pearl.
Here’s another fun activity, which is to arrange the jumbled letters or scrambled movie titles. Another suggested activity is to make our own movie projector!
This month’s pin features the Illuminating Filmmaker, Ava DuVernay!
Challenge #1: Build a Shadow Theater. Our heroine this month is so passionate about telling stories through film! For the first activity, my kids made their own “movie theater”! They can tell their own stories using the end product of this activity.
The booklet came with detailed instructions for each activity. There’s also a story from Camp Reel Stories that the kids can use with the movie theater.
For this activity, the box provided a shadow theater frame, theater top, vellum sheet, puppets, wood sticks, clothespin, glue dots, folded card, and light.
Here’s what will make up the stage!
For the light holder, we used the shortest wood stick and the folded card.
For this, you just need to cut the shadow puppets and make a holder using the other wood sticks and the clothespin.
The box also included some bonus storyboards that kids can use to plan out their story’s scenes. There’s a box for the drawing, plus lines below it for a short description. This will help ensure that the story will go on smoothly when the kids use the shadow puppets and the theater!
My daughter set up the stage first! She easily set the stage by folding the sides of the frame to make it stand. The theater top goes on top of the red curtains on the topmost part of the frame, and she used glue dots to stick it there. The vellum sheet goes to the frame opening and she also used the glue dots to stick it on the frame.
After that, she set up the light source as well and placed it on the back of the stage.
She used the cut-out puppets and made a scene from what she had planned on the storyboard.
She used different animal puppets for her story! It’s fun, and my younger kids were truly entertained by the show!
Challenge #2: Make a Thaumatrope. The second activity is about making a thaumatrope! It’s a fun animation toy that creates the illusion of two pictures blending into one!
The materials for this activity are wood slotted dowel, animation cards, and sticky foam!
My daughter cut out the animation cards first and folded the cards before sliding them on the slit on one of the dowel’s ends. She then spun the dowel and we were amazed at what happened with the images on the cards!
My kids made their own designs on some of the cards! They really like this activity, and they love what happens on the images as they spin the dowel!
Challenge # 3: Popping Experiment. Popcorn is definitely our all-time favorite cinema snack. My kids were really excited about the 3rd activity because it involves popping some corn kernels for an experiment and snacking on them afterward!
For this activity, we used popcorn kernels, parchment paper, and a popcorn bag! Salt and butter are optional!
We put the kernels on the parchment bag and microwaved them for 3 minutes. It smelled nice when we opened the microwave to take the popcorn out!
We added some salt in the parchment and shook it. Then, we transferred all the popcorn on the popcorn bag. We’re ready to watch a movie as we now have our snack!
Ava DuVernay is really an inspiration for aspiring storytellers! Working behind the camera is not just fun, it also helps raise important issues and help other people! My kids love all the activities this month as they were able to express themselves by making stories using the shadow puppet theater. They also enjoyed the image effects that they were able to do with the thaumatrope. Of course, we all enjoyed the delicious popcorn! My daughter also proved how vast her imagination is with the story she made for the shadow puppet theater and I’m so proud! This box is amazing as it introduces us to heroines that the kids (even us adults) can look up to, with amazing causes and talents to share with the whole world!
Do you enjoy Girls Can Crate as much as we do? What’s your favorite thing about this subscription?
Comments