Plate XXI in Johann Bernhard Basedow, Elementarwerke für die Jugend und ihre Freunde, Berlin, Germany, 1774. From the collections of the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation.

CONTENTS

The next
Electronic Field Trip is

The Industrious Tradesmen
April 10, 2008

Guests rarely see Colonial Williamsburg's twenty-first-century toolmaking shop. Tucked in a corner of a modern maintenance area, it is out of the way, little known, not on tours, and seldom visited. But within its doors is a mechanical wonderland where craftsmen use today's technology to accurately reproduce an array of eighteenth-century tools and objects. Historic Area interpreters use these creations—saws, surgical instruments, surveying equipment, and apothecary weights, among other things—to make the colonial world come alive.

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Johann Bernhard Basedow was a German educational reformer who presented his plan for the education of children in his book, Elementarwerke fur die Jugend und ihre Freunde (Elementary Work for Youth and their Friends). The illustrations in the book include maps, plans, views, plants, animals, minerals, trades and professions, musical instruments, the arts and sciences, historical scenes, scenes from daily life, and all sorts of objects, implements, and utensils. Plate XXI shows the interior of a German cabinet shop.

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"Tools have stories to tell. . . . By looking closely at the ways tools functioned and how people used them, we can learn about the everyday tasks of early Americans and understand more fully the jobs they accomplished and the things they made." In this lesson, students compare eighteenth-century tools with their present-day counterparts, and discuss how tools have, or have not, changed over time.

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Colonial Williamsburg offers a variety of quality instructional materials dealing with 18th-century life, including:

• Earning a Living as a Tradesperson in Colonial America (lesson unit)
• Tools: Working Wood in Eighteenth-Century America (book)
• The Historic Trades Series (booklets)
• Think Like a Historian (Primary Source CDs)

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April is National Poetry Month

April is National Poetry Month, a time to celebrate poets and their work. Various events are held throughout the month by the Academy of American Poets and other poetry organizations. Many online resources are available to help you incorporate poetry into your classroom instruction, including:

• Academy of American Poets
• International Reading Association
• National Education Association
• Library of Congress Poetry and Literature Learning Page

—Henry Ward Beecher, 1870