While learning about Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad, explain that it is believed quilts with hidden codes directed southern slaves to the route to freedom during the American Civil War. With pre-cut pieces of fabric or paper, introduce students to the Log Cabin quilt pattern. Red centers in this pattern symbolized a safe house for slaves attempting escape. The pattern is also significant because we associate President Abraham Lincoln with a log cabin.
Make geometry basics fun for children through quilting. Give them various paper shapes and a pre-cut "quilt block" on which to arrange them. The shapes must completely fill the block. Hang all the blocks on a wall to show the class "quilt." You could also teach measurement by bringing lap quilts to class for groups of students to measure. Challenge each group to measure with items such as cubes, paper clips and yard sticks.
Enhance reading comprehension skills and teach the value of journal writing by reading "The Josefina Story Quilt." The story is of an American girl's pioneer family (and pet chicken) moving west in the 1850s. She chronicles events that happen along the way in the quilt blocks she makes. Challenge your second graders to journal an event important to them with a quilt block. Creating paper "quilt blocks" will be more efficient for this lesson plan.
Bring quilting into lessons about recycling and the environment. Explain that over the centuries, some quilts have been made for utilitarian purposes. Scraps of clothing, feed/grain sacks and other old fabrics were recycled and used to make quilts. Ask students to bring a cloth item that has outlived its usefulness and show them how it can be made useful again in a quilt. Ask crafty parents to help make a completed quilt from the scraps.
Emphasize the individuality of art by comparing it to the individuality of fingerprints. The lesson is that students should respect the individuality of others as well as themselves. Give students fabric squares and non-toxic paint and have them decorate their block with their hand prints and fingerprints. Encourage them to make designs from their prints or to embellish them by gluing on other small elements like rhinestones, googly eyes, buttons, shells and foam pieces.