Everyone can tell you about the “shot heard round the world,” but do you know what led to that shot? What were the steps that drove us inexorably from a colony to an independent nation?
It certainly wasn’t a straight shot, and makes for a fascinating bit of homeschool history lesson as we look at the Boston Massacre and the early steps to revolution. This makes a great early lesson in an American Revolution Unit.
{This post contains affiliate links}
But where does the Boston Massacre start?
First, you need to back up a little bit. England had passed a series of taxes and laws that the colonists hated. They were spoiling for a fight and went to great lengths to start one. It all came to a boil when a regiment of soldiers tried to calm a mob, and the soldiers in a panic fired into the mob.
Look at this masterful stroke of propaganda by Paul Revere. Even what we call this event today is a stroke of genius designed to get people mad. I go into a lot more detail in my Paul Revere unit study on some great discussion questions.
But this is the masterpiece that starts all of this. I wanted the kids to get a better idea of how hard it is to engrave, so we made our own engravings to print with.
Boston Massacre activity: make an engraving
Of course, you can’t learn about a master engraving like that without trying your hand at it. To give it a try yourself, you’ll need a few supplies:
clean styrofoam tray (I asked our local HEB store, and they gave me a few empty trays), bamboo skewer, poster paint, a foam paint brush (yes I do buy this in 25 packs, because these are great for spreading mod podge or similar types of things) or a brayer (I’ll admit I just use the foam brush, but figure some of you might have a brayer)
The kids set to work carefully etching their creations into the foam. We discovered it was harder than it looks, to help you out, here are a few tips:
- Don’t press too hard, because you end up poking holes, rather than making smooth lines.
- What you print will be reversed, so if you are writing anything, make sure your letters are in mirror writing (one of the girls was saddened to see her writing mirrored)
- Simple works better than complex (at least with the implements we’re using)
Once your design is done, paint a thin, emphasis on THIN layer of paint over it. Press your design onto the paper, and you’ve created a paper engraving.
My kids’ designs were mostly poking holes to make patterns, but I still think it turned out rather interesting.
What else happened in Boston besides the Boston Massacre?
We followed up the talk of the Boston Massacre with some general talk about what happened in Boston before the American Revolution. To help them see just how much was going on I printed off this map from Time Travelers: American Revolution.
How Boston Started the American Revolution
Now, let’s look at how this made it a big giant mess afterward… It all starts with a small protest, you might have heard of it, The Boston Massacre.
All right, here goes Future Ticia 2026 is combining another post with this one as they are both covering similar topics.
The British soldiers were guarding the town from rowdy colonists. Also known as the people who lived there.
The colonists didn’t like all of the extra soldiers, so a mob of them came and started crowding the soldiers. The soldiers panicked and shot into the crowd wounding and killing several people. This led to more anger in the colonies, particularly after the famous wood cutting made by Paul Revere.
In response to other things as well as this (which I won’t go into here) the British government raised taxes on several different things, including tea.
The colonists (accidentally played here by Redcoats) were infuriated and boycotted tea, and one night protested by storming one of the ships in the harbor and throwing all of the tea overboard.
Well, Britain couldn’t let this stand, so they imposed the Intolerable Acts which was yet more taxes and more things to make everyone angry.
The British were tired of all of this American rabble-rousing, so they planned to secretly go out at night and arrest several of the leaders of this crowd and take away the guns of suspected rebel towns. Paul Revere and others heard about this plan and rode off to warn the people.
Paul Revere was arrested by the British soldiers and was forced to stop for the night, but not before word got out. His friend, who did not get a poem written about him and therefore is not a household name, was able to warn everyone else about the British plans.
Stay Tuned for the ensuing battle…….. Lexington and Concord and then whether America agrees or not, the colonies are at war with Britain.
Leave a Reply