This time last year, we launched into a week’s worth of American history, starting in the year 1770. Since it was the week of July 4th, I thought it would be a great theme for a week of summer lockdown learning and activities. Specifically, we did a countdown, or timeline leading up to the historic events that made us a nation. This week is packed full of all sorts of education for your little ones. If you want to throw in some extra patriotic activities or add some American history to your homeschool curriculum, read on for some ideas. We learned a lot practicing the Pledge of Allegiance, having our own tea party, writing our own list of grievances to those in charge, re-enacting the midnight ride, watching a new series, training to be minutemen and so, so much more. Some of my more patriotic memories include our fifth-grade play, “Fifty Nifty United States.” I still remember the song that taught us all 50 states in alphabetical order. I sang it for my boys recently and they were impressed. They asked if I could say all 50 states. I don’t think they expected me to say yes, much less sing them in order. The whole grade put on the play and we practiced for what seemed like forever. I still remember a beautiful song we sang about Amelia Earhart. I also remember loving the song, “God Bless the U.S.A,” by Lee Greenwood as a child. Don’t forget James Brown performing “Living in America,” in Rocky IV. Ray Charles performing “America the Beautiful,” is also a classic. Then, there’s the smell of mosquito repellant, which always makes me think of heading out to our local park to watch the fireworks. Patriotic music, families on blankets or in chairs in their red, white, and blue all waiting for the nighttime display. Good Times. We started our timeline off in 1770 with some events in Boston, Massachusetts. Keep reading to follow our march toward freedom. Even if you don’t have the ability to complete the entire weeks’ worth of activities, hopefully you can get some ideas for a couple of fun, educational things to do with your kids to highlight the significance of this important part of our story as a nation.
A Whole New Kind of Tea Party
We started by taking a look at what was going on in 1770 in Boston. I pulled up the site at the link below to describe the layout of the country at that point in history. The article has some good information about the 13 colonies that came together to form the United States of America. Our plan for the week was to learn about a couple of significant events each day and add them to our timeline. For our first day, we discussed the Boston Massacre and the Boston Tea Party. I have included a link below with two short videos outlining the main points of what occurred. The shorter videos hold the boys’ attention, and provide a launching point for discussion as they usually have more questions. I grabbed a few smaller poster boards, some markers and we started our time line. We drew the main line and then added our first time point for the Boston Massacre, which took place in 1770.
I asked the boys what they thought happened at a tea party. They appropriately answered, “you drink tea and eat yummy cookies.” I explained that of course that is a typical tea party, but we were going to learn about a very different kind. I made some patriotic punch for us to enjoy as we learned about this famous event. I have included that recipe link below as well. It really just involves layering some juice according to sugar content. Then add some fun straws, and you too can have an unconventional tea party. That kind of reminds me of a time I overheard someone ordering at Sonic. The woman said she wanted the burger and shake deal, but she actually wanted a grilled cheese and a slush. Welcome to our tea party, we are having punch. It’s ok. The one that took place in 1773 wasn’t traditional either. Something else I discovered was the Liberty Kids series. It is a fictional series that follows two child reporters that work for Benjamin Franklin’s newspaper, and they cover the events of the Revolutionary War. The boys enjoyed it and it is very educational. They have approximately 40 episodes I think, and we had at least one each day that we watched to reinforce what we learned about. I included the link to the Boston Tea Party episode below as well. We also printed off the Pledge of Allegiance and had the boys practice each morning. All in all, it was a great first day of American history.
1770: 13 Colonies
Video: Boston Massacre
Video: Boston Tea Party
Timeline dates for day 1: Boston Massacre March 5th, 1770 and Boston Tea Party December 16th, 1773
Liberty Kids: Boston Tea Party
Night Rider
I know what you 80s kids are thinking. No, I’m not talking about Michael Knight and his pimped out Trans-Am, KITT. I love history so, admittedly I love this week’s activities in general, but this day is definitely one of my favorites. After practicing the pledge, we dove into the First Continental Congress and the famous midnight ride of Paul Revere. I ordered a couple of colonial hats for the boys for another activity during the week, but my little one found another use for his. He put on his hat, hopped on my old horse I had when I was a baby, and went through the house shouting, “The British are coming!, the British are coming!” It was adorable, but I am biased. Moving on. I like the video below that is a short 5-minute overview of the who, what, when, where and why of the FCC. You simply watch the instructor fill out the important details, but I think the format makes it easy for kids to put it all together. Plus, we learned a new word, grievances, which we came back to in another of my favorite activities. Now, she did get the part about George Washington being from Georgia incorrect, but she acknowledged it and I think the video is still a good format for grasping the main facts. Speaking of grievances, after explaining what that term meant, I told the boys to make a list of their grievances to those in charge (that would be me and their dad). I highly recommend doing this with your kids as their list of demands was hysterical. I made no promise to make any changes, so I am probably headed for a revolution, but I will keep you posted.
Then we watched the short video on Paul Revere. We learned a bit about him and his famous ride through town to warn the colonists. For an easy activity, we made our own lanterns. Using milk cartons, a glue gun, some tissue paper, scissors, a wire or something to serve as the handle, and some electric or flameless candles, we each made a lantern. Then you can put them in the window in keeping with the story; one if by land or two if by sea. Essentially, we cut out three of the four sides leaving about a half-inch around to glue our tissue paper to. I left the tops on and just poked a hole through in order to put the handle through. We used the candles like the ones in the link from Amazon below. I don’t know about you, but with my boys, the key word here is flameless. The kids got a kick out of using the tiny remote to turn them on and off. Since technically, I am the enemy, I wonder if they will put them in their rooms and communicate with each other when they hear me coming? We finished things off with the Paul Revere Liberty Kids episode and adding the important dates below to our timeline. A very educational day!
Timeline dates for day 2: FCC Was September 5th, 1774; Paul Revere’s ride: April 18th, 1775
Video: Facts about FCC
Video: The Midnight Ride
Liberty Kids: Paul Revere
Lock and Load
On day three, we added some historic battles to our timeline. We also attempted our own minutemen drills and even learned about how music was utilized on the battlefield. We were getting really good at saying the Pledge by day 3. After breakfast, we started off with a video about the Battle of Lexington and Concord, and the ‘shot heard around the world.’ These were important battles for our timeline as the time for protesting and boycotting had clearly come to an end. With these battles and the accompanying casualties, it was clear that the revolutionary war had begun. We also watched the video below about the Battle of Bunker Hill. The few Battles of America videos done by FreedomProject Media that I have seen are pretty good for kids. Bunker Hill was significant in that the colonists were severely outnumbered and even though it was technically a British win, the thousands of casualties they suffered made it feel like a loss. The damage the militia were able to inflict proved to seriously boost morale, and as we all know, they kept on fighting.
To help put things in perspective we also looked at the short videos below on how to load a musket and fire a cannon. The link to cannon facts has some interesting information. I didn’t realize the number of people needed to fire a cannon or the number of steps involved. We also learned about the minutemen, colonists who formed their own militia units and were self-trained in weaponry and strategy. The got their name because they were trained to be ready at a moment’s notice. So, I decided to put my little ones to the test. I gave them each a hat, a nerf gun and bullets, and a backpack with a few items to load. I grabbed my timer and we started drilling. It was pretty adorable, and I think ultimately it will come in handy. Let’s just say there are times I think they could move a little faster when getting ready for school. I also included a link below to an article complete with video clip demonstrations of how they used music on the battlefield. It was quite the task to communicate direction to an entire army, so they learned the specific note sequences that instructed them to turn left or turn right, for example. We rounded the day out with two more Liberty Kids episodes, one for each of our battles and of course added our new events to our timeline.
Video: shot heard around the world
Video: Bunker Hill
How did they do that? load a musket; load and fire
How did they do that? cannon facts
Video: cannon demonstration
Timeline dates for day 3: Battle of L&C: April 19th 1775; Battle of Bunker Hill June 16th, 1775
Liberty Kids: Lexington and Concord
Liberty Kids: Bunker Hill
The Break from Britain
For day 4, we got to add The Declaration of Independence and the famous Delaware crossing led by George Washington himself. George Washington was clearly an impressive leader and we learned all about his life and accomplishments in the article below. Prior to becoming our nation’s first president, he served as a delegate to the First Continental Congress and was named commanding general of the continental army. He is known for his leadership in keeping the struggling army together and motivating them to continue the fight. His brilliant strategy in crossing the Delaware on Christmas Eve in icy waters to catch the British and accompanying Hessian soldiers off guard was just one of his many great accomplishments. We also watched the video below about the Declaration of Independence which has some great facts about this important document and the overall significance of this moment in the history of our country. Our activity for the day was making our own flash cards. We wanted to test our knowledge and see what all we had learned. The idea was to put a person or event on one side of the card and then write a new fact learned on the other side. So much fascinating history to pick from! This was fun and the boys enjoyed telling me what they remembered from our daily activities.
Now, the Declaration of Independence is clearly an important document, and we now know that it lives in the National Archives. One has to ask, “I wonder how easy it would be to steal it, say if you needed to protect it from treasure hunters?” We turned to Nicholas Cage for that answer, popped some popcorn and watched National Treasure. It was not just any popcorn, though, it was patriotic popcorn. Make your favorite popcorn and then add some red and blue candy melts. Drizzle the colored, melted chocolate over your popcorn and add some red and blue sprinkles. At some point we watched our Liberty Kids episodes about the Declaration of Independence and the Delaware crossing. Finally, we added our two new events to our timeline, dates below.
Video: Declaration of Independence
Facts: All about George Washington
Liberty Kids: Declaration of Independence
Liberty Kids: Delaware crossing
Timeline dates for day 4: Declaration July 4th, 1776; Delaware crossing December 25th 1776
Stars and Stripes Forever
It was finally time to talk about the Flag. We learned all about our flag in the first video below. It is actually a reading of the children’s book, The American Flag. We recited the Pledge of Allegiance and then watched a second video outlining how we show respect to the American flag. In it, we even learned the flag’s nicknames, like Old Glory. We sang “The Star-Spangled Banner” and the song “You’re A Grand Old Flag.” The events we were adding to our timeline for this day included the date America chose a flag and the famous winter at Valley Forge. Admittedly, I searched and searched for a video for kids about the hardships of Valley Forge, but I could not find a good kid-friendly one. The soldiers faced lack of food, and supplies, including shoes while enduring freezing temperatures. If that wasn’t bad enough, they also suffered diseases such as dysentery and smallpox, so some of the videos seemed a bit mature for kids given the dramatizations of those hardships. We did have a Liberty Kids episode on the subject, so I felt like that was sufficient!
In honor of the freezing temperatures the continental army faced, we made watermelon slushes to enjoy while watching our Liberty Kids episode. I included the recipe link below. We discussed those super cold conditions as we drank our super cold beverages. If you have not read up on the army’s experiences at Valley Forge, I recommend it. Washington, Hamilton, and a military strategist from the Prussian army managed to whip the continental army into shape even in the midst of those life-threatening conditions. Most historians agree that the fact that Washington was able to hold the army together and produce the well-trained soldiers that faced the British at the battle of Monmouth in June of 1778 was an incredible military accomplishment. Our next activity was painting the original flag and the current flag. I let the boys choose what flag they wanted to make, and we talked about the meaning of the stars and stripes as we worked on our art to reinforce what we learned from our earlier videos. Of course, we rounded out our day with updates to our timeline, adding the events listed below.
Video: the Flag
Video: how we respect the flag
Liberty kids: Valley Forge
Timeline dates for day 5: America chooses a flag June 14th, 1777; Valley Forge-winter of 1777-1778
The Birth of a Nation
Typically, I have about 5 days of activities for our themed weeks, but there were a couple of other important dates to add to our timeline in our march toward freedom. So, we overflowed a bit into Saturday with our final events that included the Battle of Yorktown and the Treaty of Paris. The Battle of Yorktown proved to be the last major land battle of the Revolutionary War and was a decisive victory. General Cornwallis surrendered and he and his army were captured, prompting the British government to start negotiation discussions. I have also included the link below to some great facts about the Treaty of Paris, and included the corresponding Liberty Kids episodes for both major events as well. I suggest making some yummy patriotic cookies as a special treat to round out this week of American history. Here is the link to the ones we made: Star-Spangled Cookies. I love the swirly tie-dye look. Finally, with the Treaty of Paris, the colonies had officially broken ties with Great Britain and become a sovereign nation of their own; the United States of America. I think the timeline is a great idea as it helps organize the events in chronological order as opposed to just learning about individual events out of context. A great book recommendation for this week’s unit is The American Revolution for Kids: A History with 21 Activities. As the title says, it is embedded with all sorts of activities to go along with the historical chapters. Link below.
Timeline dates for day 6: Battle of Yorktown October 19th 1781; Treaty of Paris September 3rd, 1783
Liberty Kids: Battle of Yorktown
Liberty Kids: Treaty of Paris
The American Revolution for Kids
To wrap things up, we can use the same format as the instructor in the video about the First Continental Congress. The ‘Who‘ turned out to be very brave, outnumbered colonists. The ‘What‘ was the war for American independence. ‘When‘ was around 245 years ago. ‘Where‘ was many various locations all throughout the original colonies. The ‘Why‘ was the desire for freedom. That is certainly simplifying a very long, grueling, dangerous set of events that let up to, and made up the Revolutionary War. I am glad we got the chance to dive into the details of some of these events and our nations first leaders. We learned a lot, and I am certainly thankful to God for all the many blessings He has bestowed on our great nation. Admittedly, I am a bit late posting this, but it is a packed week of American history which is applicable whenever you are covering this subject with your little ones, not just the week of July 4th! A very happy birthday to America!
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