Welcome to America! This week, in our history studies, we learned about the first British colony in America, Jamestown. It was named for Elizabeth I's nephew, James, who was now the King of England. James gave a charter and his royal permission for a group of British adventurers to form a company and try their hand at planting a new colony in America. On May 24, 1607 three ships sailed up a river and landed on a small peninsula near the Chesapeake Bay carrying 105 passengers. The Jamestown settlement suffered one disaster after another: poor land, bad farming, malnutrition, fire, drought, fighting with Indians and at times a lack of strong leadership. But, eventually Jamestown survived because the colonist learned to grow their own food, treaties were made with the Indians and tobacco proved to be a very marketable cash crop. The Upper Grammar class was very busy making paper models of the Jamestown Colony. They did a great job, providing great detail in their models. The Lower Grammar class discussed what they would take on a voyage across the sea if they only had a shoebox to put all of their stuff in! They then made quilts like those that would have been used to keep the settlers warm. Downstairs, the FIAR class read the book, "Bear Snores On." It's a story about a little mouse who creeps into a sleeping bear's den to try to keep warm during the coldest part of winter. The kids then made cute bear puppets out of paper bags!
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