Iceland Unit

As I was researching Iceland I learned a few things, primarily they eat a lot of fish, and there is not much info out there on Iceland for kids. Practically none. Which made creating this geography lesson a little tricky, but I kept going and created a decent Iceland Unit.

I did eventually find an Iceland fish craft, that I incorporated with a go fish game that I’ve had pinned forever and voila our Iceland craft was born.

Iceland Unit: Go fish craft

Supplies (affiliate links): Foam-Sheets, sequins, Match Sticks, Yarn, Magnets, empty altoid tin, Glue, Paper Clips(these are the least expensive versions I could find)

Directions for Iceland craft

1.  Cut out something vaguely resembling a fish from the fun foam.  Bemoan the fact in your head they do not look anywhere near as cute as the ones from the post you saw.  Laugh as your kids happily create 200 fish blobs.

2.  Glue on sequins for some bling.  In the inspiration post, they were supposed to represent ice.  I don’t think bright pink is very ice-like.  When the glue is dry flip over the fish and glue on paper clips.  It may take several hours for the glue to dry, there were a lot of sequins.

3.  Tie about 9 inches or so of yarn onto the end of the matchsticks.  Then stick the magnet to the other end of the yarn.

4.  Stuff about 200 fish into your empty Altoids tin.  It’d be cuter if you decorated it, but that would slow down the kids’ ability to play with the game.  Laugh as they disappear with said game, and entertain themselves for minutes on end.

Attempt to get as many fish onto your “hook” as you can at one time while your sister screams you’re cheating, and that’s not fair.

Oh wait that last part may be optional.

Iceland Unit: Icelandic Pepper Cookies

Recipe was vaguely inspired by Icelandic Pepper Cookies (and apparently this is no longer a live post), vaguely because I was out of supplies.

Future Ticia 2022, we studied Iceland again a few years later, and remade the cookies, so I did successfully make it with the original ingredients. The recipe card reflects how to correctly make it when things don’t go wrong.

Ingredients:

• 1 1/4 cup softened butter (or microwave it just before mixing, same thing right?)
• 1 1/4 cup of white sugar honey
• 3/4 cup light corn syrup maple syrup
• 2 eggs
• 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt used salted butter which we accidentally bought
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 2 teaspoons cloves
• 1 teaspoon ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper

So let’s pretend I did anything remotely right with this recipe and they turned out wonderful.

Instead, it went like this:

Uh oh, no sugar, desperate call to a baking friend, no answer, google sugar substitutes, use honey

Where’s my brand-new jar of corn syrup?  NOWHERE, that’s where.  Maple syrup can work, it’s probably just corn syrup made to look like maple syrup anyways.

No, don’t shatter the egg all over!

Why won’t these cookies cook?  It’s been almost 20 minutes and they’re still not cooked all the way through

And in the end, we had a cookie that tasted rather like a spice cookie, and still somewhat doughy, and did not come off the cookie sheet looking like a cookie, but like a giant blob.  It’s like my ability to make cookies has disappeared.

Poor me.  So, no there are no pictures of the finished result.

Future Ticia was able to get a picture of our completed cookies.

Icelandic Pepper cookies

Print

A sugar cookie variant that is great for a cold winter day

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 15 minutes

Additional Time 30 minutes

Total Time 55 minutes

Ingredients

• 1 1/4 cup softened butter
• 1 1/4 cup of white sugar
• 3/4 cup light corn syrup
• 2 eggs
• 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 2 teaspoons cloves
• 1 teaspoon ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Instructions

1. Cream together the softened butter and sugar.
2. Add in the eggs, vanilla, and corn syrup.
3. Slowly mix in the baking soda, baking powder, flour, and the rest of the spices.
4. Mix until thoroughly incorporated, then chill for 30 minutes.
5. Roll out dough and cut out cookies, or slice off round cookies.
6. Bake in oven at 350 for 15 minutes.

Iceland Unit: Country Report

Invent your own funny story for the excuses my kids gave why they hadn’t originally finished the report I gave them. The list was long and varied.

They did eventually complete their page with much silliness abounding.  Much silliness.  So much silliness.

Get your own version of the Iceland country report. Meanwhile, I’ll consider hitting my head against the wall with my computer problems, so many things not working right.  Get the country report lapbook pages (both of these are on my subscriber page: join my newsletter to get access).

Future Ticia 2022, here is the updated version we put together

Iceland Unit notebooking pages

We used the Europe notebooking pages and filled them out.

We didn’t find a whole lot of facts to stand out. We were quite amazed how much they talked about fish, even learning about it again as high schoolers.

Future Ticia 2023 wants to mention that I have added some notebooking pages and a booklist to the Subscriber section. I do not have pictures of the minibooks.

Iceland Unit resources

Hi! I’m running late on getting everything updated, I told my son I’d get together with him, so here we go. I’m just gonna be lazy and point you to the Geography Now Iceland video.

Wow! He’s got three videos on it!

And finally the Flag Friday post.

Iceland books

Future Ticia 2023 says, somehow when I updated this post I forgot to add in the books we read, and there was one I remember from when I first wrote this post almost 10 years ago.

But, I have to pause, so I can go cook dinner, I’ll be right back.

I lied, I’m now back over 6 hours later.

• Iceland– from the True Book series, and like most of these is just a good overall book
• Puffling Patrol– following the adventures of children who rescue puffins, also it looks like there are two editions, and this is different from the edition my library has (different cover)
• Nights of the Pufflings– another book on how children, and one particular village rescue stranded puffins, and when I looked this particular book up on Amazon, I found at least two more books on this same topic, so very popular for easy nonfiction
• How the ladies stopped the wind– does anyone else remember Between the Lions? I particularly remember this book being read on Between the Lions in one of the episodes.
• Going fishing– A charming book about a young boy going fishing with his Dad if I remember correctly (I’m writing this up a couple of years later)
• The problem with chickens– I also remember this one being particularly funny, and as I’m writing this up, I just realized the last three books are all written by the same man
• RockMan vs. WeatherMan– Miss Frizzle and the class go on a field trip to Iceland, where they learn about rocks and weather. I remember nothing about this book.

Go see the rest of our Europe Unit.

“Iceland: Viking Rune” by vicmontol is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

Originally published March 25, 2014, republished 2023 because I had it in the draft folder and went to publish it only to find out I already had done so. Go figure.