How to Teach Kids About Life on the Great Plains

Life on the Great Plains could be both tough and rewarding

Whether you're a school teacher, home-schooling parent, or just have kids interested in frontier or Native American life on the Great Plains, there are plenty of resources available on the topic in print, online, and in video formats. Some resources focus on the facts of life on the Great Plains, and others offer hands-on activities for kids so they can experience a bit of Plains life for themselves.

Instructions

1. Read some books about Great Plains life from various perspectives. You can read to your students or kids, or ask them to read a book or two and write or present a book report on them. There are books on life on the Great Plains for all level of readers, from picture books to adult books. The Morton Grove Public Library's Webrary has a list of books on frontier and Great Plains life. For young readers, try Eve Bunting's picture book "Dandelions," about a little girl and her family settling in Nebraska; Marilynn Reynolds's "The Prairie Fire," about how a girl helps protect her Great Plains home from a fire; or Joyce Carol Thomas's "I Have Heard of a Land," about a female African-American homesteader. Older kids might like Nancy Antle's "Beautiful Land: A Story of the Oklahoma Land Rush," about a family moving to Oklahoma to claim land; Stanley Applegate's "The Devil's Highway," about a Choctaw girl; or Laurie Lawlor's "Addie's Long Summer," in which a girl teaches her city cousins about life on the Great Plains.

2. Watch the PBS television series "Frontier House." In this reality show, three families abandon the comforts of the twentieth century and, equipped with only items available in 1883, move to Montana to claim land, build cabins, and farm. Two of the families have young children, who talk about their chores, daily life, and what it is like to experience Great Plains life after having lived in the modern world. The PBS website for the show, PBS Frontier House, offers additional footage, interviews, photos, and essays about life on the Great Plains.

3. Experiment with recipes and crafts from the period of Great Plains settlement. Cook some recipes from Barbara Muhs Walker's "The Little House Cookbook: Frontier Foods from Laura Ingalls Wilder's Classic Stories" or Mary Gunderson's "Cooking on the Lewis and Clark Expedition." Have your students try out Great Plains crafting with projects from Mary Cobb's "The Quilt-Block History of Pioneer Days: With Projects Kids Can Make" and David C. King's "Pioneer Days: Discover the Past with Fun Projects, Games, Activities, and Recipes." Build a Plains teepee following the instructions at the Plains TeePee website, and spend a day and night living in it as Native Americans would have.

References

• The Morton Grove Public Library's Webrary
• PBS Frontier House
• Plains teepee