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| The Columbus Notebook Lesson is available for free at TPT! |
Everyday we talk about a different aspect of Columbus' voyage to help the students better understand what happened so long ago. On Columbus day, we discuss who Columbus was using the Columbus Notebook file and later in the day, the students make the Columbus page in their The Ocean Blue books. Day 2 we talk about the three ships and make the ships page. Day 3 we talk about the Taino Indians and discovering the New World. At the end of the week not only do students understand why we celebrate Columbus Day, but also have a wonderful little book to take home and read over and over again!
The last page of this file has a surprise! Because we are an Arts Magnet, we tied in music and artwork depicting life during the time of Columbus. Just click on the links to see them and share with your students.
I saw some of your Columbus Day ideas on Pinterest, and I wanted to offer some constructive criticism. It may be a popular belief that "People thought the earth was flat," but that's just not true. They may have believed that Columbus was sailing to his death, but that's mostly because they didn't know exactly how large the earth was. Columbus' theory actually turned out to be wrong--the world was larger than he thought. People have known that the earth was round since at least the time of the ancient Greeks, and medieval scholars never lost that knowledge.
ReplyDeleteSo instead of continuing to teach an untruth, perhaps you could replace the line with something like, "No one knew for sure how big the earth was, but Columbus thought it was small enough to sail to Asia. He discovered that the world was a much bigger place than he ever expected!"