A Social Studies and Language Arts Activity

 

Treasure Chest Rare Book:

John Latrobe's - The Juvenile National Calendar ca. 1825

The Juvenile National Calendar: Pages 1 and 2
The Juvenile National Calendar: Pages 3 and 4
The Juvenile National Calendar: Pages 5 and 6
The Juvenile National Calendar: Pages 7 and 8
The Juvenile National Calendar: Pages 9 and 10

Instructions

Read the text and look closely at the illustrations. See if you can answer the following questions: 
  • How can you identify the date and place of publication?
  • What is this book about?  How do you know?
  • Who is the intended audience?  Children or adults?  Can you support your ideas?
  • Where do you think this book would have been used?  Why do you think that?
  • The author is giving information about government.  Why do you think he chose this style of writing?
  • What message is he sending to the reader?
  • Look closely at the illustrations.  Choose one page.  What is happening in the picture?
  • Does the illustration give any additional information that is not in the text?
  • What additional information would you like to have about the content or author?  Where do you think you can find this information?

Suggested Activity

This book would be very different if it was written today.   Using the same writing style as the author, write a few pages of a book describing today's government.  Do you think that this is a good format to teach about government?  Can you think of a better way?
 
 
Photograph
Letter
Map