House 43 Digest Online

Each week, House 43 makes entries as a class in their Archaeological Dig Diary. This year, we have it online in our blog for you to read and enjoy. We also have pictures or your viewing pleasure posted on this blog and on the 3rd Grade website. The link on the website is called “Day 1 and 2 of H43’s Archaeological Dig.” The children wrote the following paragraphs as a class on our snowy Friday, which would have been the children’s third day of digging.

House 43 is in the process of excavating in an archaeological dig with actual dirt from the ground of Kashgar (Kashi), China. We dig in Little Dalton’s garden or mini-backyard. We dig on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.

We rotate through five jobs: excavator, screener, mapper/logger, recorder, and washer. The excavator digs out the dirt with a trowel and uses the brush to uncover the artifacts. Sometimes the screener finds objects, too. The dirt is given to the screener to sift out smaller artifacts that the excavator might have missed. The mapper maps the artifacts in situ (in place) on a paper grid. The excavator tells the logger the properties of the artifacts and where it was found. The washer washes the objects that are not made of wood, metal (except gold and platinum, which do not rust), cloth or bone. They dry brush artifacts that cannot be washed. The recorder cuts an index card in half (to not waste paper) and they stamp the index card with a stamp that says “Dalton Site,” “Level,” “Square,” and “Description.” The recorder then writes the information for each artifact on a card. The card is placed with the artifact in a plastic bag. If the artifact is too big, the card is taped to the artifact.

There are three strata. We are almost through the first level. The first level is made from mostly soil. When we reached the bottom of level one, we accidentally uncovered some of the second level. We found that the second level is made of white clay. The dig site is divided into four rectangular areas labeled A, B, C, and D. Our instructor is Dr. Neil Goldberg.

Some of the artifacts we found on Day 1 and Day 2 of the dig are the following. In level one, we found a lot of Mahjong tiles, a porcelain statue of a person, jade stone statue of a lion, a wooden flute, a bicycle pedal, pieces of plates, green jade elephant statue, white jade turtle, a bicycle break, a green jade turtle, a purse with coins and paper money in it, a porcelain pot top, a tea kettle, a short metal knife, brass statue of a person with bells, porcelain cups, and an Indian coin. In squares C and D, we found many artifacts. We also found many artifacts in all of level one. They were made of many types of materials: gold, jade, stone, bone, wood, silver, and cloth. Digging the archaeological dig site is so much FUN and we would like to keep doing this fun project!