Continental Sloop Providence

LESSON 4: THE LIFE OF A SAILOR

Target Ages:	5th through 8th Grades

Purpose:	The purpose of this lesson is to show the students history. By making the students compare their own lives to the lives of both modern day sailors and historical sailors, hopefully, the students will come away with a better understanding of what life was like 200 years ago. This can be pertinent to the lives of the students by getting them interested in history. It makes them see how other people live (or used to live), and can make history seem more real and interesting.

Length:	15 to 30 mins

Objectives:	The concepts gained from this lesson will allow the students to picture how sailors, and to a larger extent how people in general, lived in the 18th Century. Also, to show how the life of the sailor is different from their life, so they can see how different people live.

Key Points:	· Differences/Similarities between the students lives and sailors lives · Providence as a Naval Vessel · Class Systems · Food/Water · Women and Minorities on Board · Beliefs and Traditions

Student Participation

Hands On-Pass around Salted Meat, hard tack, barrel, pictures of figureheads, diagrams/pictures of a hold, diagram of sleeping arrangements, bowls (wood/metal), hat, coins, whatever else is on hand. Ask Questions of the students-make them think!

Materials Needed

Salted Meat, hard tack, barrel, bowls, hat, other 18th-century items.
Diagrams: inside of a hold, figureheads, sleeping arrangements, etc.

Station logistics and safety

The best place for this lesson is up forward or maybe in the Great Cabin, but it may be done almost anywhere. Up forward, the jib sheets can be dangerous during a lot of maneuvering, as well as if they are left loose.

Starting Point

"What are some specific similarities or differences between your life at home and my life on the boat, besides I live on a boat, it's smaller, it moves, it's on the water?"

"How was life different in the 18th Century than today?"

Procedures

1. Ask them about how their lives compare to our lives or those of an 18th- century Sailor.
a. Electricity/Engine Power
b. Head and Showers

2. How was the Captain different than the crew?
a. # of men on board as a Naval Vessel
b. Living quarters
c. Why was the captain the Captain (Class Systems)

3. Supplies-Food/Water
a. They had to bring everything on for the trip
b. What did they eat?
c. Water in a barrel for 6 mo's
d. SCURVEY

4. Women on Board
a. How/Why
b. Dressed as boys
c. Wives

5. Were there ever minorities/ex-slaves on board
a. How/Why?
b. Passage to Freedom
c. Shanties

6. Misc.
a. Traditions
-i. Shanties
-ii. Superstitions
-iii. Stories (Mermaids)
-iv. Figureheads
-v. All boats are FEMALE

b. Deck Prisms
c. Windlass
d. Rigging

Findings, Observations and Discussion

I have found that this lesson works well if you can get the kids, to both think and pay attention. Sometimes looking off the side of the boat is too interesting. I think that with more hands on activities, it could be more interesting for the kids.

Real-World Applications

This lesson applies to the real world, by giving the kids a glimpse of what the world was like. This could spark an interest in history, which could lead to a career or hobby dealing with history or even sailing.

Links to State Framework

Rhode Island Skills Commission publication "Social Studies Standards (SSS)" contains benchmarks requiring historical knowledge of different eras. It states: "History opens to students the great record of human experience… By studying the choices and decisions of the past, students can confront today's problems and choices with a deeper awareness of the alternatives before them and the likely consequences of each" (SSS).

Since the PROVIDENCE is a reproduction of a Revolutionary War Era warship, she is an ideal platform for expanding the students' historical knowledge of the SSS defined Era 3, Revolution and the New Nation. This lesson, demonstrating the connection between sailors of that era and students' lives today, is a window to awakening their curiosity about other historical topics: Trade, political and economic themes, international relations, and how technology has influenced history. This lesson is the hook to bring them to the world of the Revolutionary War Era.

When the students are introduced to the PROVIDENCE and shown how simple machines work in concert to help a small crew complete tasks that appear at first to be impossible, they gain a new appreciation of the role of technology in the real world.

Vocabulary

Head Galley Quarterdeck Guns Class System Salted Meats	Hard Tack Scurvy Figurehead Passage to Freedom Sea Shanties	Superstitions Deck Prisms Windlass Rigging