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Title: Jobs in Jamestown
Topic: Various occupations and roles of the first Jamestown settlers
Objectives:
- Recognize different kinds of historical roles and apply knowledge in writing exercise.
- Research the occupations of Jamestown settlers using census data in Virtual Jamestown.
- Evaluate data and create a bar graph and key to show numerical differences among roles of settlers.
- Use graph in conjunction with primary document by John Smith to discuss historical question.
Va. SOLs:
4.3 (History) The student will explain the economic, social, and
political life of
the Virginia colony, with emphasis on characteristics and contributions
of various groups of people.
4.19 (Math) The student will collect, organize, and display data in bar
graphs with scale increments of one or greater than one.
4.3 (English) The student will read and learn the
meanings of unfamiliar
words.
4.7 (English) The student will write effective narratives and
explanations.
4.9 (English) The student will use information resources to research a
topic.
Materials
needed: One networked computer and printer, writing and art
materials, and several dictionaries may be necessary
Procedure:
- Before class, prepare students' "job
assignments"
Print out as many copies as necessary for the class, and cut pages so
that there are enough slips with individual jobs and their descriptions on
them.
- Ask some opening questions: "If you were traveling to a far-off, wild place, what kinds of people would you bring with you? What kinds of things would you want someone to know how to do? What skills do you think would be important?" (Suggestions:
grow food, build houses, make clothing, etc.)
- Tell students to pretend that they are all going to be new settlers
in the Jamestown colony. Give each student a "job assignment." (Printed
out and prepared in the first step). These are now their new
occupations.
Students read about their "job assignments."
- Provide crayons and art materials. Students make individual "applications" to live in the colony by making a picture of what they are going to do when they get there (as a carpenter, laborer, etc.) They write a short paragraph explaining what they are
doing and why they are the best candidate for the job of "Jamestown Carpenter," etc.
- Divide students up into groups of 4 or 5. One group will use the computer while everybody else works individually on their applications.
- Explain that the occupations they have now were all real occupations held by the first Jamestown settlers. Students will now research the kinds of occupations at the settlement and find out how many people performed which jobs:
Find Virtual
Jamestown
on the web, hand over the mouse to the "designated driver."
Remind student group that they are looking for census information
about the settlers, ("censuses"), and that they must find information
about their occupations. ("Occupations of
the New World.")
Have them print out a copy of this form and look at total numbers.
- Students make a bar graph which shows how many men performed each job, using different colors to show different categories. They also make a color key.
(More advanced students may create a pie chart to show the percentages of men in each category)
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