The Secret School Plans
_Making a “Life Line”
Purpose
This lesson uses the life story of an important person to develop a time line - integrating history, literature, and mathematics.
Procedures
Share the story "The Secret School" from The Tree that Owns Itself and Adventure Tales from Georgia’s Past (Atlanta: Peachtree Publishers, 1996). Tell students that this story is based on a real historical figure who lived in Savannah.
Mathilda Beasley is a Georgia Woman of Achievement.
Click here to read the Savannah Morning News article about her receiving this honor:
Savannah's Mother Mathilda will be honored as one of Georgia's 'Women of Achievement.
Tell students to pick out events (e.g. Mathilda Taylor Beasley’s birth and death) and dates. These dates will be used to construct Mother Beasley's "life line," a time line of the important dates in her life.
Have students arrange the dates in chronological order. Ask students what historical events might be added to the time line. (The start and end of the Civil War are noted on the time line in the book’s Table of Contents.) Have students decide if they wish to end the time line with the death of Mother Beasley or extend it into the twentieth century to include the founding of Savannah's Beasley Park.
Other important dates not mentioned in the story or epilogue include:
Mathilda Taylor married Abraham Beasley in 1869
Abraham Beasley died in 1878
Mathilda Beasley, studied to become a nun - Georgia's first black nun - in England in 1885
"Mother" Beasley established an orphanage for black girls in Savannah in 1887
She founded the first black community of Religious Sisters in Georgia in 1889
(Notice that the story contains a "literary liberty": the story is set before the Civil War, and Mathilda married five years after the war's end. However, during the events of the story, Mathilda is referred to as Abraham's wife, Mrs. Beasley.)
Discuss the use of time line to display events: Explain that a time line is like a ruler, with equal-sized space intervals between equal-sized time intervals. In other words, if an inch equals five years on one end of the time line, an inch must also equal five years at every spot along the time line -- even if events bunch up in one spot! Tell the students to expect some crowded spots and some empty spots on their time lines.
Ask the students how many years must be displayed on their time line to include all the important dates selected by the class. Subtract the earliest date from the most recent date; ask students to suggest how large the time intervals (one month, one year, three years, one decade, etc.) should be organized to best display Mother Beasley's life line.
Either construct the time line on the board or overhead projector or have students create their own time lines on paper.
Extending the Lesson
Have students construct a “life line” of another historical character. (This activity works well with Paul Anderson, the main character in the story "Georgia's Strong Man" from The Tree that Owns Itself and Adventure Tales from Georgia’s Past (Atlanta: Peachtree Publishers, 1996).
Purpose
This lesson uses the life story of an important person to develop a time line - integrating history, literature, and mathematics.
Procedures
Share the story "The Secret School" from The Tree that Owns Itself and Adventure Tales from Georgia’s Past (Atlanta: Peachtree Publishers, 1996). Tell students that this story is based on a real historical figure who lived in Savannah.
Mathilda Beasley is a Georgia Woman of Achievement.
Click here to read the Savannah Morning News article about her receiving this honor:
Savannah's Mother Mathilda will be honored as one of Georgia's 'Women of Achievement.
Tell students to pick out events (e.g. Mathilda Taylor Beasley’s birth and death) and dates. These dates will be used to construct Mother Beasley's "life line," a time line of the important dates in her life.
Have students arrange the dates in chronological order. Ask students what historical events might be added to the time line. (The start and end of the Civil War are noted on the time line in the book’s Table of Contents.) Have students decide if they wish to end the time line with the death of Mother Beasley or extend it into the twentieth century to include the founding of Savannah's Beasley Park.
Other important dates not mentioned in the story or epilogue include:
Mathilda Taylor married Abraham Beasley in 1869
Abraham Beasley died in 1878
Mathilda Beasley, studied to become a nun - Georgia's first black nun - in England in 1885
"Mother" Beasley established an orphanage for black girls in Savannah in 1887
She founded the first black community of Religious Sisters in Georgia in 1889
(Notice that the story contains a "literary liberty": the story is set before the Civil War, and Mathilda married five years after the war's end. However, during the events of the story, Mathilda is referred to as Abraham's wife, Mrs. Beasley.)
Discuss the use of time line to display events: Explain that a time line is like a ruler, with equal-sized space intervals between equal-sized time intervals. In other words, if an inch equals five years on one end of the time line, an inch must also equal five years at every spot along the time line -- even if events bunch up in one spot! Tell the students to expect some crowded spots and some empty spots on their time lines.
Ask the students how many years must be displayed on their time line to include all the important dates selected by the class. Subtract the earliest date from the most recent date; ask students to suggest how large the time intervals (one month, one year, three years, one decade, etc.) should be organized to best display Mother Beasley's life line.
Either construct the time line on the board or overhead projector or have students create their own time lines on paper.
Extending the Lesson
Have students construct a “life line” of another historical character. (This activity works well with Paul Anderson, the main character in the story "Georgia's Strong Man" from The Tree that Owns Itself and Adventure Tales from Georgia’s Past (Atlanta: Peachtree Publishers, 1996).