Disclaimer: I received a FREE copy of The Mayflower at Cape Cod through the HOMESCHOOL REVIEW CREW in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way.
Although we love history in our homeschool, I find it’s often difficult to find a curriculum that is willing to go beyond the standard teachings and really dive into the details in a meaningful way. The Mayflower at Cape Cod – Stories, activities, and research that connect 1620 with life today by Rebecca Locklear is one of the few that we have found that is willing to look at the hard questions and tell all side of the historical stories, not just the side of those who have written our history.
About The Mayflower at Cape Cod
The Mayflower at Cape Cod tells the story of the Pilgrims and Native Indians from a culturally aware perspective. The eBook contains seven lessons:
- The First Encounter between the Pilgrims and the Native Indians
- Exploration Overview
- The Mayflower Landing at Cape Cod
- Search Expeditions
- Native Indians
- After the First Encounter
- Present Awareness- Cross-Cultural Communication and Travel Tips, Native Indian Issues Today
The Lessons are geared toward 6-12th graders and each lesson is broken down in a similar pattern.
- Background Information
- Historical Story
- Summary- usually looking at all points of view
- Activities
- Additional Research Topics
Each lesson offers multiple extension activities that can really help to bring the lessons to life for the students.
Each lesson could take anywhere from 3 days to a full week or more, depending on the number of activities you choose to do with your students.
The Mayflower at Cape Cod is one of the most balanced historical curricula to tell the story of the Pilgrims and Native Indians that I have found so far. Having strong ancestral roots in Native Indian lineage on both sides of our family, this story has strong meaning for us. I am comfortable using this as a tool in teaching my children about our history.
Our Experience
Although aimed at 6-12th graders, I used The Mayflower at Cape Cod with both my rising 3rd grader and 3-year-old boys. I only scratched the surface of the content that this product offers, but I was happy with the results nonetheless.
Seeing that Native Indian history is so very important to our family, I am super cautious about what information my boys are exposed to in their history curriculum. For that reason, the lesson I chose to work on with my boys was Lesson 5- Native Indians.
The lesson starts out with a story that shares nine answers to the question- What is known about Native Indian culture on Cape Cod in the early 1600s? The information shared is informative and was interesting enough to keep the attention of my busy boys.
Following the story, there are 10 extension activities to choose from. My boys really enjoyed learning about dugout canoes and watching the video from Oregon Field Guide “Sunken Canoe” about a dugout canoe found on the bottom of an Oregon Lake. This has spurred talks about digging out their own canoes- so we’ll see where that takes us.
I also printed out the cards for the Seafood and Foul matching game and my 3rd grader enjoyed playing that as well.
Overall, I would say we enjoyed the parts of this curriculum we used and as I looked over the parts we haven’t used yet, I found them to be very culturally sensitive. I feel like we will be able to successfully use The Mayflower at Cape Cod as part of our historical heritage education for my boys.
Connect with Rebecca Locklear
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[…] “The Mayflower at Cape Cod is one of the most balanced historical curricula to tell the story of the Pilgrims and Native Indians that I have found. Having strong ancestral roots in Native Indian lineage on both sides of our family, this story has strong meaning for us. I am comfortable using this as a tool in teaching my children about our history.” Jenn W., Homeschool Educator FULL REVIEW HERE […]