Welcome to the twelfth and final instalment of Culture Box!
Sequoia Tree by Martin Jordan
Oil on Canvas
A print of this painting with its corresponding activities is included in this month’s physical box.
Sequoia trees are the biggest trees in the world. They are also among the oldest trees in the world.
In the picture you can see a woman, a man and a child admiring a huge Sequoia tree. On the right of the picture a seed cone and a branch with leaves. Sequoia trees are a kind of pine tree with tiny prickly leaves.
Here’s a selection of prompts for conversation about the Sequoia Tree, or feel free to make up some of your own:
Do you know how tall they can grow?
They can grow to well over one hundred metres tall (more than three hundred feet).
How long do you think these trees can live?
They can live for more than three thousand years. Sequoia trees grow wild in just one place, although they can now be found in parks and gardens all over the world.
Do you know where they came from originally?
California, in the United States of America.
Sequoia trees have very thick bark which protects them from forest fires.
Can you guess how thick the bark of a Sequoia tree is?
One metre (three feet) thick, no other tree in the world has such thick bark.
These trees do not grow from a shoot but from a small seed as small as 5 millimetres long and a millimetre wide. These seeds are propagated from cones when they dry up due to fire. They never stop growing until they die. Unlike other plant and animal species that stop growing once they get to maturity, even after thousands of years, the sequoia still grows. In its lifetime, it grows in all aspects from height, width and hardiness.
We hope that you enjoy this short 1:15 minute film that contains some really fascinating facts about the Sequoia Tree.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyYXuZy5FdI
Sequoia Colouring In Activity
SEQUOIA TREE – Colouring-in/painting activity
The line drawing above shows a seed cone from the sequoia and a branch of leaves for you to colour.
You can use whatever you would like to colour in this illustration:
Paints
Felt tips
Coloured pencil
Tissue paper
What colour do you think that the cone should be? Here are some examples of the seed cone in their natural environment ranging from pale green to dark brown. Or paint them a completely different colour and go abstract instead!
And the leaves are a variety of colours depending on the time of year.
Perhaps you would like to include some people in the picture?
Music from California Summer of Love 1967
The Sequoia tree is native to California, and we thought you might enjoy some songs and pieces of music that also originate from the West Coast of the USA. Some of them are associated with the Summer of Love - a music festival that took place in Monterey in 1967.
So, wear some flowers in your hair, turn on, tune in and drop out….
California Dreaming - The Mamas and The Papas
Are You Going to San Francisco? - Scott McKenzie
Amy May Come With Me
Come With Me is a piece of music written especially for Culture Box by performer and composer Amy May.
The piece starts with an invitation - Come with me - initially in English, but you will also hear the invitation spoken in many different languages.
Listening to the piece, we then join Amy as she visits different imaginary places, which are conjured up by a combination of sound effects and atmospheric music. Over about 20 minutes, the piece leads us to imagine:
being at the seaside,
sitting in a café listening to a band,
being out in the snow,
dancing at a carnival,
walking in a forest,
returning home.
We hope that you will enjoy listening to music. You may want to chat about places that you have visited and enjoyed spending time - favourite beaches, favourite walks, or parties and celebrations with friends and family. You may want to sing along with any songs that are familiar, or dance. You could find or create pictures inspired by the music. You could talk about how the music makes you feel.
We have included a chiming instrument if you would like to play along
About Amy May
Amy is a composer, arranger, and multi-instrumentalist, specialising in the viola and violin.
Her music has been described as being "like Arcade Fire playing in an English country garden.” (NME). She writes commercial music for TV, films and adverts, and collaborates with contemporary artists, performers and film makers. She orchestrates and arranges for bands from Muse to SBTRKT and helps create and realise live performances of music by electronic and non-classical artists.
Amy currently plays viola and violin for the multiple Grammy award winning 'Hamilton', is the Principal Viola of the Heritage Orchestra and works as a live and session musician for a wide range of bands and artists, from Snow Patrol to Emeli Sande.
Amy’s composing and arranging showreel can be found here
Click on this link to listen to Amy’s Come With Me
Larry Amponsah Yonka Bia
Yonka Bia ‘a place of oneness’ - a game by Larry Amponsah
A Note for Carers
Board games such as Ludo and Dominoes are very popular with older people from many cultures. Playing regularly can provide a host of benefits, from helping improve sharpness to bringing people together!
We hope this game will create moments of fun and connection for participants and carers alike. Why not spend an afternoon learning the game together?
The Game Board
Special areas of the board are coloured yellow, green, red and blue. These are the yards, the starting squares, the home columns and the finishing home square in the centre.
Each player chooses a colour and takes their four coloured counters, to place in their matching yard. The counters stay in their yard until they are ‘in play’ on the main board.
The main board is set up like a cross with four arms. Each arm has three rows of squares, including a coloured row that corresponds to one set of counters. This represents that player’s home column, leading to the home square in the centre.
The coloured space marked with footprints is a player's starting square. Counters follow the footprints in a clockwise direction, and must complete a full lap before entering the home column, towards the finishing home square.
How to Play
Each player places their four counters in their matching coloured yard.
Each player rolls the dice. The player with the highest number starts.
On their turn, a player will roll the dice and move a counter if possible.
A six must be rolled in order for a player to move a counter out of their yard
and onto their starting square. A player that rolls a six can roll again to move
their counter forward, according to the dice value.
Play moves clockwise left to the next player.
When players have multiple counters out of their yard on the board, they can choose which piece they want to move for the number rolled.
When moving around the board, counters always move clockwise, following the footprints.
Players cannot move past an opponent’s counter. If another counter is blocking the way, opponents will need to land on the same space to capture it.
If a player lands on another player’s counter, the opponent’s piece is captured and sent back to their yard. The returned counter can only re-enter play when its owner rolls a six.
If a player finishes their turn by landing on another of their own counters, the pieces form a block. A block cannot be landed on or passed by an opposing piece.
If a player rolls a six, they get to roll again. If they roll three sixes in a row, their turn ends immediately.
How to Win
When a counter has completed a whole lap around the board, it will enter its home column towards the finishing square.
A piece can only enter the finishing square by exact roll.
The first player to get all four counters into the finishing square wins the game!
Additional Rules
In parts of Africa, these rules are sometimes added to make the game more exciting!
A block also stops counters of the player who created it, or blocks them unless they roll the exact number to land on it.
A counter that lands on an opponent's piece not only sends them back to their yard, but also sends the landing piece to its home column.
A player cannot move their first counter into the home column unless they have already captured at least one opponents’ piece.
If a player lands on an opponent’s counter, they are awarded a bonus roll.
There are four safety squares on the board, where a counter may move forwards or backwards and start their turn before the previous player finishes.
The game can be played in partners. Partners should sit opposite and can exchange numbers rolled.
Great Tit Video
The Great Tit is one of our best-known garden birds, common throughout the UK and seen all year round. It often visits bird feeders, performing acrobatics - maybe hanging from an upside-down coconut.
It has a very varied song, but it’s most distinctive call is a loud, two-note song. It is often said that you can recognise it, as it sounds like a child in class trying to get attention, calling out ‘teach, teacher, teacher!’
Is there a bird table where you are?
Do you recognise the Great Tit’s song?
What kind of a student were you at school?
If you like watching birds, then there is a live web cam that runs 24 hours a day here:
The Paintings in Hospital Creative Care Homes is available as a digital download and as a printed booklet. All the activities can also be viewed online.