Learning About Russia- Activities and Resources

General Information:

Russia is the world's largest country at over 6 million square miles. It spans across the northern region of both Europe and Asia. It shares land boarders with Norway, Finland, Estonia, Belarus, Latvia, Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, China, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, and North Korea.

The climate varies depending on region. The flat grasslands of southern Russia, often called steppes, have warm summers, and fairly cold winters. The northern sub arctic regions have cool summers and frigid winters.

Capital- Moscow

Population- 144.5 million

Size- 6.6 million square miles

Currency- Russian ruble

Type of Government- Federation

National Anthem- State Anthem of the Russian Federation

National Animal- Eurasian brown bear

National Bird- Eagle

Russian Flag:

Famous Monuments and Places:

St. Basil's Cathedral- St. Basil's Cathedral is a famous cathedral located in Moscow. It was commissioned by Ivan the Terrible in 1555. The cathedral consists of 10 chapels. Originally the building was painted primarily white and red, but was later painted with elaborate colorful patterns.

Today it operates as a museum, and is one of Russia's most recognizable landmarks. You can take a short video tour of the inside here: Inside St. Basil's Cathedral. For a quick look at the outside, check out this video from GeoBeats Science: St. Basil's Cathedral- Moscow.

Photo by Julius Silver from Pexels

Peterhof Palace- Peterhof Palace is a series of palaces and gardens in St. Petersburg, Russia.

You can see parts of the palace and gardens in this short video: Excursions in St. Petersburg Peterhof Grand Palace.

Or watch this short video about the Palace's history from the State Hermatige Museum: The Winter Palace of Peter the Great.

State Hermitage Museum- The State Hermitage Museum is an art and culture museum in St. Petersburg, Russia. It is the second largest art museum in the world.

You can visit their site for virtual tours and information about their exhibits: The State Hermitage Museum.

Lake Baikal- Lake Baikal is located in the northern region of Russia, known as Siberia. It is the world's oldest and deepest lake.

You can read more about Lake Baikal in this article from the Smithsonian: Lake Baikal and More of the Weirdest Lakes of the World.

Recipes:

For our Russian meal we made vareniki, which are Russian style peirogie. They are so good! We also made Russian tea cakes, commonly called snowball cookies here in the U.S.

Vareniki

Russian Tea Cakes

Here are links to the recipes we used, plus a few other Russian recipes you might enjoy trying:

-Basic Russian Vareniki Dough (we filled ours with mashed potatoes, bacon, onion, and cheese)

-Russian Tea Cakes

-Blini (Russian pancakes)

-Kurnik (Russian chicken pie)

Crafts:

Faberge Egg Craft

Faberge eggs are a series of elaborate decorative eggs created for the Russian Imperial family during the late 1800s and early 1900s by the Russian fine jewelry company Faberge. There were a total of 50 eggs in the collection. 10 eggs were commissioned by Emperor Alexander III, and 40 by his son Nicholas II as Easter gifts for his mother and wife.

You can learn more about Faberge eggs and see some in this video from JTV: The History Behind Russia's Royal Faberge Eggs.

After you've looked at some of the Faberge eggs and learned a little about their history, try designing and making your own eggs!

For this activity you will need:

-Eggs: You can use plastic Easter eggs or real blown eggs. If you use real eggs I suggest using extra large eggs because they provide a larger surface for decorating.

-Tacky glue

-Craft jewels

-Acrylic paints

-A paint brush

If your using real eggs you will need to blow them out and clean them first. If your using plastic eggs you can skip this first step. To blow out an egg, start by poking a small hole in one end by gently poking through the shell with a thumb tack. On the other end use the tack to make a slightly larger hole. Shake the egg a little bit to break up the yolk, then blow the insides out of the shell by blowing on the smaller hole. If you have trouble getting it all out, try shaking the egg a little more or widening the larger hole a little with the tack.

After your egg is empty, gently rinse it out with a little soap and water and then set it aside to dry.

While your egg is drying, you can make a simple stand to display it on when it's finished. A stand also provides a place for it to dry after you decorate it. For our stands we just cut a toilet paper roll into a few slices and decorated them with markers and paint.

Once your egg is dry, it's time to decorate it. Paint designs with the acrylic paints and glue craft jewels to the shell. Make it as fancy and elaborate as you like.

When your egg is finished, set it on your stand to dry.

St. Basil's Cathedral Drawing Activity

St. Basil's Cathedral in Moscow was commissioned by Ivan the Terrible in 1555. It was originally painted mainly white and red, but in the late 17th and early 18th centuries it was painted with vividly colored patterns, making it the very recognizable cathedral that it is today. Nobody is sure who the artist or artists were who painted it.

Since it's such a beautifully designed and decorated building, we thought it would be fun to draw and color. We followed this simple drawing tutorial on YouTube from Ashley Cassens: How to Draw: St. Basil's Cathedral (for kids!)