New World Explorers Unit Study and Lap Book

This year we are making Lap Books to go along with each of our six Unit Studies for American History. Our first Unit was based on New World Explorers. While the girls were busy working on their Kaya Lap Books, the boys were busy making their own Lap Books with printable mini books from the Time Travelers New World Explorers CD.

Resources and Books for Unit One: 
(you can print our Unit One Plans/Booklist here)

Core Text 

• From Sea to Shining Sea (Chapters 1-3)

Additional Books read by the Boys:

• The Usborne Book of Explorers
• Saint Brendan and the Voyage Before Columbus
• Brendan the Navigator
• Leif the Lucky
• Columbus
• First Voyage to America: From the Log of the "Santa Maria"
• Where Do You Think You're Going, Christopher Columbus?
• The Voyage of Christopher Columbus in His Own Words (A Pop Up Book)
• Ponce de Leon: Exploring Florida and Puerto Rico
• Who Was Ferdinand Magellan?
• Ferdinand Magellan: Circumnavigating the World
• Ship's Boy with Magellan
• Hernando Cortes: Spanish Invader of Mexico
• The Lady of Guadalupe
• Story of Our Lady of Guadalupe Empress of the Americas

Coloring Books:

• The Story of Christopher Columbus
• Exploration of North America Coloring Book
• Our Lady of Guadalupe

Timeline Entries:

• c. 484-c. 578 Brendan the Navigator
• c. 1000 Leif Erikson discovers North America
• 1492 Columbus Discovers America
• May 4, 1493 - Line of Demarcation (set by Pope Alexander, the boundary divided the New World between the Portuguese and the Spanish)
• Jan. 6, 1494 – First Mass in the New World
• 1454-1512 Amerigo Vespucci
• 1460-1521 Juan Ponce de Leon
• 1480-1521 Ferdinand Magellan
• 1485-1547 Hernando Cortes
• 1531 Our Lady of Guadalupe
• 1510-1554 Francisco Vasquez de Coronado

Here are a few pictures of some of the boys' entries to their History Through the Ages Record of Time timeline book during this Unit:

Additional Activities:

• Build A Pueblo Diorama
• Chocolate Caliente on Columbus Day
• Play Settlers of Catan - Catan: Seafarers Game Expansion
• Play Knot So Fast (A super fun game for learning and practicing knot tying!)
• Create a File Folder Game  (Each Boy Made their Own)
• Assemble a New World Explorers Lap Book

 ~ NEW WORLD EXPLORERS LAP BOOK  ~ 

~ THE FRONT COVER ~

~ INSIDE VIEW #1 ~

The dark blue center page/flap addition contains a little invocation to Our Lady of Guadalupe, with a miniture version of Charlotte's Coloring Page, at the top, and the Navigational Equipment Wheel on the bottom.

On the Left Flap: 

5 Reasons for Exploration

Line of Demarcation

On the Right Flap:

“Real Estate” Brochure

Sea Monster pop-up

~ INSIDE VIEW #2 ~

Center Flap #2 : Treasure Chest; Anatomy of a Ship

~ INSIDE VIEW #3 ~

The Center of Actual Lap Book Folder contains a pocket for all the Acetate Maps the boys created, with overlays for the explorers routes.   

 

The boys had so much fun making these!  

On the back of each of the inserted pages were all the Explorer Profiles.


Inside the boys wrote the place of birth, which country they explored for, the years of each expedition and the discoveries that each explorer is best known for and/or interesting facts.

All of the profiles are on color coded paper representing the country for which they were exploring.



 

The boys finished this unit up last month and have since moved on to Unit Two.  They have been studying Jamestown, the Pilgrims, Ben Franklin, and Colonial Life.   We are hoping to finish up by the end of this month, before moving on to the very much anticipated Unit Three, based on the American Revolution!