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Flat Stanley goes to Antarctica
Flat Stanley is the title character of a 1964 children’s book by Jeff Brown.
Flat Stanley book cover
Stanley Lambchop is flattened by a falling bulletin board. He survives and makes the best of his altered state and soon he is sliding into rooms through the opening at the bottom of closed doors and being kind to his younger brother by playing as a kite for him. Stanley even helps catch some art museum thieves by posing as a painting on the wall! But one special advantage is that Flat Stanley can now visit his friends by being posted in an envelope.
The Flat Stanley Project
The project was started in 1995 by Dale Hubert, a third-grade teacher in London, Ontario, Canada. The project facilitates letter writing by schoolchildren to each other as they document what Flat Stanley has done with them.
The Flat Stanley Project provides an opportunity for schoolchildren to make connections with schoolchildren of other member schools who’ve signed up with the project. Schoolchildren begin by reading the book and becoming acquainted with the story. Then they make paper “Flat Stanleys” and keep a diary for a few days, documenting the places and activities in which Flat Stanley is involved. The Flat Stanley and diary are posted to other people who are asked to treat the figure as a visiting guest and add to his diary, then return them both after a period of time.
In 2005 there were more than 6,000 classes from 47 countries taking part in the Flat Stanley Project.
OM(W) Alicia Gooderham pictured with Flat Stanley in the seaboat in Antarctica.
HMS ENDURANCE has this deployment taken a Flat Stanley to Antarctica, a world `first’ for any Flat Stanley and the Royal Navy. The Flat Stanley in question belongs to Anca from William Shakespeare School, Timisoara, Romania and since HMS ENDURANCE left Portsmouth last summer, Anca has been regularly updated with her Flat Stanley’s progress in Antarctica.
Anca from William Shakespeare School in Romania
For variety's sake, not all Flat Stanleys are named Stanley. One of these, Flat Mark, gained considerable media attention in Canada in late 2003 when he was the "guest" of newly-sworn-in Prime Minister Paul Martin, and appeared in a photograph with his cabinet at the swearing-in ceremony at Rideau Hall. Additional media attention was generated when Clint Eastwood took his daughter's Flat Stanley to the Academy Awards and another has been onboard a NASA Space Shuttle.
Flat Stanley on Seymour Island, Antarctica
Flat Stanley on Seymour Island, Antarctica
Seymour Island is an island in the chain of 16 major islands around the tip of the Graham Land on the Antarctic Peninsula. Seymour Island is sometimes called Marambio Island or Seymour-Marambio Island, taking its resident Argentine base as its namesake.
Base Antárctica Marambio is Argentina’s main base in Antarctica. The base’s primary purposes are scientific. The scientists stationed at the base observe cosmic rays, glaciology, ionospheric properties, auroras and meteorology in addition to monitoring stratospheric ozone.
The average temperature on Seymour Island is 1ºC during the summer and -21°C during the winter. In the wintertime, however, strong winds can lower the wind chill temperature as low as -60ºC.
The Flat Stanley Project is an international literacy and communications project mostly supported by Primary and Junior schools.
More information about the project is available at www.flatstanley.com
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