Building Bounty: Bamboo

Eli Whitney Museum

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Vacation Program

  • Tuesday, April 16, 2013
  • 9:00 am – 3:00 pm
  • Designed for ages 7 to 12

Bamboo is one of nature's amazing gifts. it is a grass with the strength and properties of wood. It get taller so quickly that it is a grass you really could watch grow (some types…3 feet in a day!) It is versatile: it can be food for pandas or people, medicine, paper, musical instruments, clothing, art, or a building material for furniture or houses or temples. It has its own legends.

Get to know bamboo. Safely cut it, slice it, bend it, sand it, weave it, last it, paint it. Everyone will build (and fly) a kite with bamboo spars and craft a bamboo whistle. Then choose projects to work on: a bamboo Samurai or doll, a water squirter or basket, wind chimes or a toy boat. The projects will introduce you to the friendly gifts of an ancient material that is still finding new purposes.


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