Lesson Plan Table of Contents

Creating the Past: Understanding Artifacts Lesson Plan

Content Introduction

This lesson focuses on the significance of material culture—the day-to-day objects surrounding individuals—to help students better understand the point of view of those living in Catlin's era. Students will develop a greater awareness of the things surrounding them and will be able to build a bridge between their own material culture and that of an imaginary figure from the past. Students will also learn more about the process objects go through as they wear. This can lead to a discussion of conservation techniques as students become comfortable with the idea of "artifacts" as old, worn objects providing unique information for interpreting the past.

Day 1

Guided Practice

You can guide the following exercise with ideas about how we know what things looked like in Catlin's time and what effect time has had on what remains from Catlin's period. Review of resources available from the Artifacts and Memory—For Students page will assist you guide the activity.

Discuss what happens to materials over time. You can inform the students about conservation techniques and ideas you have gained from the Artifacts and Memory—For Students page. Questions to consider include: What kinds of materials deteriorate over the period of a life or a century? What do people do to preserve materials and possessions for the future? What can be done to already deteriorated materials to conserve them?

Independent Practice

Have students search Catlin's Letters and Notes for objects to which he refers. Examples of some keywords are cups, coffee-pot, plate, easel, canvass (his spelling), shoe. Ask them to discuss what kinds of objects they find.

Day 2

Guided Practice

In a discussion, ask students to imagine what things must have looked like in Catlin's lifetime. How did people dress? What did shoes look like? How did people travel? To make this easier, consider brainstorming with students the items that we surround ourselves with every day: telephones, pens, t-shirts, toothpaste, and so forth. Then try to find an equivalent model from Catlin's period. Focus the discussion on items Catlin might have taken with him or acquired while traveling on the Missouri River in 1832. Why would he have chosen to take certain things and not others? Brainstorm until there are as many items as there are students in the class. Ask students to consider what Catlin may not have brought and why not.

Independent Practice

Ask students to choose an artifact to re-create. It may be a newspaper article or an undiscovered journal entry or an actual object mentioned at some point by Catlin or feasibly useful to Catlin. Students should write one paragraph explaining their object and its relevance to Catlin's life. If the object is a letter, it should be only one letter from the artist's mother, father, wife or brother. The letter should look appropriately aged. Art supplies and other objects should look used and aged and should take some time to produce, at least 1 to 2 hours. Provide some time for this in class and, if possible, after school.

Have students prepare a 2-to-3-minute presentation on the relevance of their objects to Catlin's life, discussing where they found the object and what they did to it to make it look old and why. Suggest that on the day of presentations they dress up and pretend to be a person from the period or a modern-day anthropologist or archaeologist.

On the day the artifact is due (a day or two after it has been assigned), have students push their desks out to form a circle. Then go around the circle and have each student present his or her artifact and its importance to Catlin's life.

Wrap-Up Activity

Conclude with a discussion on how objects suggest identity, time period, and other facets of an individual. What do Catlin's objects say about him? What do the things we surround ourselves with say about us?

Vocabulary

anthropology, archaeology, material culture.

Standards

National Center for History in the Schools—Historical Thinking (5–12):

• Standard 2: Historical Comprehension
  E. Students should be able to read historical narratives imaginatively, taking into account (a) the historical context in which the event unfolded-the values, outlook, options, and contingencies of that time and place; and (b) what the narrative reveals of the humanity of the individuals involved-their probable motives, hopes, fears, strengths, and weaknesses.
  I. Students should be able to draw upon visual sources to clarify, illustrate, or elaborate upon information presented in the historical narrative.

National Council of Teachers of English:

• Standard 1: Students read a wide range of print and nonprint texts to build an understanding of texts, of themselves, and of the cultures of the United States and the world; to acquire new information; to respond to the needs and demands of society and the workplace; and for personal fulfillment. Among these texts are fiction and nonfiction, classic and contemporary works.
  
  
• Standard 12: Students use spoken, written, and visual language to accomplish their own purposes (e.g., for learning, enjoyment, persuasion, and the exchange of information).

Lesson Plan Table of Contents

Home | Site Info | Campfire Stories | For Teachers
Interviews | Search