hands on history

I have a few unit studies that have been half-baked since Mr. Senior graduated, so today I am going to share 5 Days of Learning Printables: The World of Columbus and Sons Day 1 for Middle and High School.Also, look at my page homeschool middle school and how to homeschool high school page for more fun tips.

Today’s printables are at the bottom, but I wanted to share my experience in how I used this book.

Too one more thing I tried to create the printables in this unit study so that you can use them for both your middle and high school kids. 

I didn’t create printables on each lesson plan, but as we saw what interested us.

WHY DID I CHOOSE THE GENEVIEVE FOSTER SERIES OF BOOKS

They are rich with background information and colorful characters that are introduced throughout the life of Columbus. 

The approach to history as a story, I feel, always makes it more appealing to young and old alike.

Another reason we chose this series of books is because we wanted to understand the everyday life of Columbus and his world. 

The events, the people, the tragedies, the discoveries, the arts and religion are all gently woven throughout his life.

Like her other books, Ms. Foster takes one character and relates him to other things going on in the world at that time.

It’s hard to live your life in any time period and not be affected by other events going on around the world.

One more idea that drew us to choose these set of books is that we wanted to focus on a shorter time period of the main character, but not lose the bigger picture of the events going on in the rest of the world. When studying history, topics can tend to stay broad. 

For example, it is hard to study history and not cover a 100 years or so at a time. 

If you want to diverge, finding other topics and events can be time consuming. 

GENEVIEVE FOSTER  SERIES OF BOOKS

These books add in key events and then you can decide if you want to casually mention them or have them a subject of an essay.

Columbus was born in 1451 and died in 1506 at the age of 55. 

Aiming at one spot in history like 55 years allows your highschooler to experience the time period in depth without losing their spot in the timeline of the story.

There is no way we can study about all the events going on.

 By focusing on a more limited topic, we have come away having a deeper appreciation for Columbus and the Renaissance period.

HELPFUL TIPS USING GENEVIEVE FOSTER  BOOKS

Because so many characters and events are folded into the story and at times quickly, it is helpful if you read beforehand to familiarize yourself with the events. 

Adding in background information on new characters involved or events will enrich your study.

I found it very helpful that we had already cycled through a 4 year study of history using a program like Story of the World and History Odyssey when my oldest son was younger. 

So my older son had a framework of events and characters to draw from.

For my younger sons, I was able to add important information and background details.  We all read this together from my then 5th grader to highschooler.

I could see how though if a student started with this book without a prior understanding of some of the events, it would be challenging and perhaps take some of the fun out of learning history.

It would not be impossible, but I would encourage you to mentor even your high school students by helping them to build a framework on whatever topic you are reading about.

Because of the constant going back/forth between countries and characters, I feel it is imperative that the teacher look ahead to see if there is some way the groundwork for each chapter can be laid out.

Too, I found it beneficial for us to orally review what we have learned prior to that time.

TIPS USING GENEVIEVE FOSTER BOOKS

Again, I feel it is important to mentor and be hands on with your highschooler. The last tip is to use the index. It is much overlooked.

The index has two sections. One is people and one is events, places, books, maps and topics. That was a key to helping me develop another topic or unit study that we wanted to focus on.  In addition, it helps you to be sure you have covered key features of the life of Columbus.

The index for Columbus reads, in part, like this:

• as a boy; sailor-to-be; first voyage; in Portugal; voyage to Iceland; marriage; studies; …., etc.

This allowed us to see key events that were coming up or to review the past evens in the life of Columbus.

HOW THE BOOK THE WORLD OF COLUMBUS AND SONS IS LAID OUT

The book is divided up into 4 sections. The section divisions make it is easier to tie in key events and relate them to the life of Columbus.

Also at the beginning of each section is where you find pictures of the people who were living at that the time.

The sections are listed like this:

Part I. When Columbus was a Boy in Genoa
{People and Events that took place between 1451 – 1474}

Part II. When Columbus was in Portugal and Spain
{People and Events that took place between 1474 – 1492}

Part III. When Columbus was Sailing from Spain
{People and Events that took place between 1492 – 1500}

Part IV. When Columbus made his Final Voyage
{People and Events that took place between 1500 and 1522}

The pictures and visuals are a must to review and study. We flipped back constantly to each section to review and my older sons preferred to draw some of the characters and maps onto a notebook sheet.

How we used this book

We followed the Literature Guide by Beautiful Feet and because we studied history together, all ages, we added some notebook pages, coloring pages and minibooks that really any level could use.

It just really depends on how depth you want to be in your study.

It is important to note that the Beautiful Feet guides are just question/ answer format and do not have background information compared to say a Teacher’s Manual like Tapestry of Grace. Again, this is what we wanted that year.  

The notebook pages and minibooks that I will be sharing are designed to complement our study of this book. 

You will still want to purchase the guide at Beautiful Feet.

In creating these pages as with all of my lapbooks and notebooks, I want them simple and to the point. Since we do a lot of other writing on various topics we choose, I want notebooking pages that are uncomplicated.

So I hope these pages can serve to supplement and enhance your study as you go through the Beautiful Feet Lesson Plans.

There are so many subjects covered in this time period, that it is impossible to cover them all, but we sure tried.

Let me start by sharing some pages that could either work as notebook pages or lapbook page covers.

Also look at my Renaissance Unit Study to enhance this one.

 Here are the other posts in these 5 Days of Learning Printables: The World of Columbus and Sons.

Day 1.
5 Days of Learning Printables:The World of Columbus and Sons Day 1 For Middle and High School.
Day 2.
5 Days of Learning Printables:The World of Columbus and Sons Day 2 For Middle and High School.
Day 3. 
5 Days of Learning Printables:The World of Columbus and Sons Day 3 For Middle and High School.
Day 4.
5 Days of Learning Printables:The World of Columbus and Sons Day 4 For Middle and High School.
Day 5.
5 Days of Learning Printables:The World of Columbus and Sons Day 5 For Middle and High School.

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