Using a primary source, students construct "found poetry," i.e., poems using words and/or phrases lifted verbatim from a source. In this case, students use Juet's Journal, which survived from Henry Hudson's Half Moon voyage. Students choose words directly from the journal. All words in the poem must be in the original source. The words are reconfigured and combined to produce a poem.
This activity guides students to make and use a simple tool -- the quadrant. Quadrants are 17th century measuring devices used by sailors to determine position. Students use the tool to record and compile data with an emphasis on gathering information and then using a scatter plot to form conclusions.
Students get a hands-on introduction to the 17th century Dutch exploration of North America by tasting food, handling period-specific artifacts, and working with maps. Educators from the New Netherland Museum are available to conduct this activity in the persona of Henry Hudson, but it could also be presented by most classroom teachers.
This lesson studies the role of nutrition in preventing disease and the effect poor nutrition had on sailors' mortality aboard 17th century sailing vessels. This one class period lesson focuses on scurvy and helps to answer the question: How did nutrition impact voyages of exploration?