Revolutionary War Unit Activities

Even though we learned this last time, I'd forgotten how to make a five-pointed star with one cut! Betsy Ross would be ashamed of me. So, we learned again! (I even used it in my primary class the next week…it fit with the lesson somehow.) You can find lots of tutorials for how to do this. We used this one.

Junie got quite good at it! Big and tiny star.

Daisy decided to make a whole flag and was surprised at how much work it took to get all the stars arranged right, the stripes to be the right width, etc.

We got to visit my friend's house again and have us show us her spinning wheel, etc.

We wrote messages with invisible ink and then (somewhat clumsily) put them over a candle flame to reveal them.

We got a real sealing wax kit from Amazon and it was fun to use! You melt the little sticks of wax over a flame and then use the stamp to press them over the fold of your letter. They looked really pretty!

Ziggy was suitably impressed.

The minuteman game we played last time was so much fun that we did it again. This time the children had to get on all their clothes and run around the house with their musket. We timed everyone and then they tried to beat their times. There was LOTS of laughter. Especially because the boots and coats they were using were so big and hard to run in!

We loved learning about Ben Franklin's glass armonica, and making a similar one ourselves. Getting the glass armonica to work was surprisingly hard! Sebastian had gotten really good at it last time, but for awhile I was convinced we had the wrong kind of glasses because we could not get a single sound out of them! (I don't actually think you have to have any certain kind of glasses, but it sure was hard at first!) It took us a good twenty minutes of trying (unsuccessfully) before we produced some sound, and another ten minutes before being able to get anything to work reliably. Junie persevered for a long time and eventually became quite good, and then all the other children were impressed and became more patient themselves too. I think everyone was able to play pretty well by the end of the day!

Junie reinvented the wheel and made this music notation sheet so she could play a song more than once, and remember which levels to fill the glasses to.

Here are some videos that demonstrate the glass armonica being played:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEKlRUvk9zc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQemvyyJ--g

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VSK_qObahWY (this one is from Mr. Rogers--it's cute)