|
Do you always celebrate your birthday? Or go watch fireworks on the 4th of July? A commemoration is an honorary occasion in memory of a person or event. On your birthday you, your family and friends commemorate you being born and on the 4th of July Americans commemorate the independence of the United States. The commemoration of Jamestown is to honor and showcase the people, culture and events that happened over the past 400 years that make Virginia an important part of America’s history.
Why should I commemorate Jamestown?
Jamestown was the beginning, even before the Pilgrims in Massachusetts, and it led the way for the America we know today. It was the very first permanent English settlement in the United States and the first relationships between the Powhatan Indians and the Europeans led to the survival of the Jamestown colony. It was where English government in America was first established and where the first representatives of our government met. The first documented Africans to arrive in North America, arrived at Point Comfort and were brought to live and work as indentured servants near Jamestown. Wow, that’s a lot of firsts! Jamestown really is important!
How does the Commemoration include me, I'm just a kid?
There are lots of things you can do to participate in and learn about Jamestown and the commemoration of America's 400th Anniversary. You can learn about Jamestown on this page and after you finish playing our fun games, ask your parents to look along with you while we show you our fun events and educational programs.
Jamestown Live!
One student ambassador from each of the 50 states including Germany and American Samoa, live interviews, performances, student reporters, and special guest host Gwen Ifill; All come together to learn about Historic Jamestowne!
Click Here to View Jamestown Live!
Come watch these fabulous characters perform at our Events! Have fun and learn about Jamestown History!
Also look for great performances from Anniversary Voices with song and dance about the founding of Jamestown and American History!
Do you have what it takes to maintain a New Colony? Discover adventure while testing your skills as Captain of the Jamestown settlers when you take the helm on the Jamestown Online Adventure game. Perhaps you know everything there is to know about Jamestown - how many points can you score as you climb the ladder from Rags to Riches?
National Geographic
Check out our Cachet Art Contest Winners and Their Designs
Discover Jamestown
America's First Permanent English Settlement is about to turn 400.
Hands on Activity: Create your own Fort Discovery! Just print, cut, and color these pages to assemble. Then have fun coloring and re creating! Click to download the Fort map and Virginia Indian village, and the African coast map, and cut outs.
Children in Early America
Discover some of the ways children lived and spent their days in and around Jamestown, Virginia during the early 17th century. You may be surprised to find that after all their chores were done they had time for a little relaxation, fun and games just like you.
Powhatan Children
Powhatan children were given a formal name at birth and received personal names, as they got older. Children received a great deal of affection from their parents and community. Babies were carried about on cradleboards while their mothers worked.
Children learned their roles and responsibilities from their elders. Girls helped to plant and weed gardens, pounded dried corn, and cared for younger children. Boys were taught to hunt and fish. When boys were young, their mothers gave them an archery test in the morning before breakfast; the mother would throw something into the air and the boy would try to hit it using his bow and arrow.
Women and children did not stay at home, but constantly had to go out of the village to do much of their work—collecting water and gathering fire wood, wild plant foods, reeds for mats and clay to make pottery.
Powhatan children also played. Boys played a type of football game, while girls played with dolls probably made from cornhusks. Boys went through an initiation ritual to prepare them for manhood.
English/European Children
In Virginia, the children of European colonists had work to do. Upper class children had to learn good manners and leadership skills. Lower class boys had to learn to farm or learn a trade such as carpentry or blacksmithing, perhaps through an apprenticeship. All boys may have learned hunting skills. Upper class girls were prepared for marriage, while lower class became household servants, or perhaps became apprentices to seamstresses.
While upper class children were likely to have a tutor or attend school in England, some lower class children learned reading, writing and/or craft skills in their home or as apprentices. Education for both classes had a religious base.
Children in 17th-century Virginia had few toys, perhaps a homemade doll, hobbyhorse or yo-yo.
Angolan Children
West Africa was in the throes of witnessing the decline of a major empire when the Portugeuse began arriving and establishing relations with a few of the coastal areas beginning in 1415. For those in the cities, life was very different and the kinds of labor were much more diverse.
West Africa was an area that embraced family and community. In Angola and the Kongo, children of these cultures, especially girls, were highly valued. Women carried their children on their backs in slings. African society did not focus on children being seen and not heard, if the father was a drummer he taught his child to become a drummer as part of their daily activities. The same can be said for iron workers, or potters, it was part of the family routine, and that family was nuclear and extended. If women spun and wove cotton or manufactured earthen vessels, or sold palm nuts and palm oil, children were also engaged. It was "All in the Family."
Get Interested In...
Great books about American history
Click here to shop at America's 400th Anniversary Store!
top of page
|
