Civil War Celebration

Our culminating unit Celebration was lots of fun! Earlier in the unit we'd talked about the new art of photography and photographers of the Civil War. Then I'd had the children take photos that told a story. We displayed them at our celebration.

Here's the invitation to our celebration, which was modeled after Lincoln's Second Inaugural Ball.

Here are the tickets—each admits one gentleman and two ladies! (These are pictures of the actual documents. It's cool to see how they really looked.)

We had one hoop skirt already, and I bought two more so all of the girls could dress up. They LOVED that! There was a great flurry of preparation all day long, doing their hair and getting all dressed.

They were lovely Civil War Belles!

Daisy did such pretty hairstyles for everyone.

And at the last moment they decided Clementine must be dressed up too, so they put her in this rather…Medieval-looking dress and a too-bit petticoat. She felt very grand!

Here are the guests arriving at the ball, the ladies on the arms of their gentlemen.

For some reason Gus felt this was appropriate attire.

We had a program to start everything off, where the children presented their Civil War Final Projects.

Ziggy hopped in at the last moment with a nice presentation on "what's in a Civil War Soldier's backpack."

Clementine added her two cents

Malachi presented "Babies of the Civil War"

And the other presentations can be read about in this post.

Next…the fancy buffet! I shortened the original menu a bit, but took all the menu items I did use from the original :) 

A great spread! For dessert I Mary Todd Lincoln's almond cake, which was surprisingly good! Very light because of the whipped egg whites, and with a nice almond flavor. It was dry a few days later, but not at all dry the day we made it. Here's the recipe…I actually blended up the almonds instead of just chopping them, so they were very fine!

Mary Todd Lincoln's White Almond Cake

Waiting politely for their food…unlike the guests at the real ball, who trampled over each other and made a huge mess when they descended upon the food, apparently!

After dinner we watched the silent movie The General with Buster Keaton (so good!) and then there was, of course, a little dancing!

Memorizing the Gettysburg Address

I challenged the children to memorize the Gettysburg Address and told them there would be a reward if they did so! Daisy, who always accepts a challenge, was the first to get it memorized, and I assumed would be the ONLY one to do so. But when the others saw her eating the RitterSport candy bar I gave her, they were galvanized into action, and they ALL ended up getting it memorized! Well, Junie, Goldie, and Teddy, I mean. I'm sure Malachi could have done it (he often memorizes 10-minute-long oratories for Debate!) but he didn't bother. :)

One day when I was talking to Abe on the phone (he's on a church mission in Texas right now) I asked him if he still remembered the Gettysburg Address. He said he didn't but he could probably do parts of it if you got him going! I think it was lots easier for me to re-learn it this time, having done it before. It's really just those last three long sentences that are the hardest.

Somehow I didn't take a video of Teddy yet! But I will update this if he still remembers it. Anyway, here are the rest of the children reciting it, for posterity. 

Goldie

Junie

Daisy

Vortex Cannons and (Yarn) Yama Men

We talked about Civil War weapons and then made Vortex Cannons, which aren't really the same thing as Civil War Cannons at all, but they're fun, anyway! You just seal up all the air in a box, cut one hole in it, and bang it on the sides to get an air vortex to come out! It's pretty easy to knock over a whole stack of styrofoam cups with the blast of air. Here's a video where they put smoke in the air so you can actually see the vortex!

The Vortex Cannon--Student Science

This was an interesting video about the many steps for loading and firing a musket and cannon.

Musket Drills and Firing Cannons

This video shows a musket firing in slow motion. Really cool.

Slow motion musket firing

And here are our vortex cannons in action. Takes a minute to get them pointed the right way, but you can sure tell when you've got it right!

We did an activity where we made yarn dolls like the children in the 1800s might have played with. My grandma called these dolls "Yama Men," for some reason, so we do too! (There's even a little song my mom would sing while creeping the Yama man up to tickle your chin…"The Yama Yama, the Yama Man, He will catch you if he can! So run for your mama, 'cause here comes the Yama, the Ya-ma Man!") 

Basic instructions are here, but it's easy to fiddle with once you get the hang of it! The kids through Teddy had no trouble making their own.

I can't say it's a very neat activity, though! :)

Daisy made a whole Yama Family. So cute!! I loved the baby especially.

Junie made different colors, and Yama Mamas as well as Yama Men.

Goldie made lots of cute ones too, but somehow all I have a picture of is this cute little puff of a baby.

Kind siblings made some Yama Men for Ziggy (or did I make these? can't remember now.)

Teddy made a really cute Yama Bunny, after which Gus demanded a "Yama Caw" for himself.

So with great ingenuity, I made one. My masterpiece!

Gus loved him! He slept with him for quite a while. Of course, these guys inevitably fall apart after a few weeks, and then you're finding yarn all over the floor and throwing them out in frustration, but never mind that—they are fun till that time comes! :)

Civil War Unit Study and Final Projects

After doing the Revolutionary War a couple years ago, it was time to study the Civil War again. I was excited because there are so many interesting and fun activities that go with the Civil War, I knew the children would like it. Here is our shelf of library books all ready to go! :)

And here's my Civil War Pinterest Board

(Click to enlarge either of these)

Here's a picture of our map of the battle of Gettysburg, for an idea of the level of impressiveness we're talking about in these activities. The eggs represent various regiments, and the pillows and books are various hills and landmarks. :) It did the job!

Ziggy's imagination was most caught, for some reason, by the description of Robert E. Lee riding to Appomatox to surrender. For awhile every paper on our house was made into a flag bearing the words "I srendr" and Ziggy rode around on his "horse," Traveler, to do the honors.

We made hardtack to try, and honestly, right out of the oven it was pretty edible. Kind of a like a dry, less-flavorful biscuit. The kids were saying how it didn't seem so bad to them, so I saved a piece and left it out on the counter for three days and THEN had them try it. It was awful, of course—rock-hard and almost impossible to chew. And we didn't even have to contend with maggots like the real soldiers did!

Another fun thing we did was get a telegraph key and learn Morse Code. Of course, the key doesn't make a noise or send a signal without anything to hook it up to, but it gives the general idea of what a telegraph operator during the war would have used. Daisy and Junie had a fun time writing and sending each other messages.

It was pretty hard to get the right letters, especially when the message was coming fast! You can see the "C"s for "correct" and the "W"s for "wrong" on Junie's paper. :)

For our end-of-unit celebration, each child chose a project to do. This was one of my favorite parts of the last time we did this unit, and this time it was the same. I love seeing the great ideas everyone comes up with! Daisy decided to do a presentation on the Battle of Gettysburg and the dedication of the cemetery afterward, where Lincoln gave his Gettysburg Address. She painted the hill where the cemetery is found, and made crosses and headstones for the hundreds of graves there.

She also made finger puppets of some of the people that were there for the cemetery dedication. The orator Edward Everett and his wife, a little girl in the crowd, and of course President Lincoln, Mary Todd Lincoln, and Tad Lincoln.

Above the puppets in this picture is the podium where President Lincoln stood to give his address.

Daisy put a teeeeeeny copy of the Gettysburg Address on the podium. Those are the real words! She printed it out on the computer. :) And as the finale to her presentation, she recited from memory the Gettysburg Address!

Teddy had the really cool idea to make a Civil War Musket. He was not content to just make a simple one like I suggested, but wanted to do every part like the trigger, the hammer, the cap, and so forth to make it accurate! I helped him find a piece of bamboo to be the ramrod and a wrapping-paper tube to be the barrel, but he constructed all the other parts himself using a box cutter and tape and cardboard. I was amazed at what he was able to do!

You can see some of the mechanism here. One white arrow points to the hammer, which is attached with a paper fastener within the barrel so you can actually cock it. The other white arrow shows the frizzen above the pan, where you set the little cartridge (or is it a cap…I've forgotten). It fits nearly onto the frizzen so it can be hit by the hammer, strike the flint, and light the charge inside the barrel.

Here is a side view. The bayonet is affixed by Velcro so it will stay on the barrel! :)

And here Teddy is dressed as a Union Soldier with his trusty musket!

Malachi stood during the program and gave an Impromptu presentation on "Civil War Babies." Very information. You can see Exhibit A in his arms.

Then Ziggy got up to do an impromptu presentation too, and Clementine joined him!

Goldie's project was about transportation and communication during the Civil War. She taught us about the telegraph, the railroad, and hot air balloons, which carried units of Civil War Spies! We read several interesting books about that. Goldie made the cutest little models to illustrate her information!

Junie's project was also amazing. She made a model of a Union Army encampment, and her attention to detail was just incredible. There were campfires, tents, cannons and cannonballs, rocks and logs painted to look like cannons and cannonballs (that was a funny little detail we read about in a book—a trick some regiments used to make their numbers and weapons appear more formidable), stray cats, and so forth. It was such a cute little scene!

Cats eating the solder's fish he cooked over the fire

A cannon, and a tiny cart full of hardtack for the soldiers

(This shows how tiny the hardtack and the barrel of coffee were)

A campfire with a roasted chicken roasting nearby (and a dog trying to steal it)

A soldier fishing in a stream outside the camp, and another hiding behind a tree

A solider bedding down for the night

I loved these projects and the good things the kids learned while working on them!