Living History

Placing History In Context

We want our children to:

• Experience history and not just read about it, so that the facts they do learn really stick.
• Grasp that history is more than names and dates--history is lifetimes lived by real people. Through living history groups they can experience many of the smells, tastes, textures, sights and sounds of earlier time periods. They can make and wear the clothes, taste the food, dance the dances, hear the stories, watch the battles of those earlier times.
• Experience things that many people only read about. When they read about Bilbo’s shirt of elven mail in The Hobbit, I want them to have seen (and worn!) real chain mail, instead of imagining knitted yarn painted silver.
• Have a sense that things were not always as they are now.
• Understand that civilizations rise and fall.
• Know that having earlier technology did not mean that people were stupid.
• Have some idea of what "king" and "lord" meant in medieval or biblical times.
• Understand that Western Civ is not just a list of dead white men.

Value of Hands-On, Real-Life Experiences

We want our participation in living history to:

• Show that it is possible to have fun without TV.
• Show that it is possible to make music without a computer.
• Show that you can make toys / armor / art that better than you can buy.
• Give them a reason to go camping a lot.

Creativity

We want our children to:

• See people imagining things and then bringing them into being, whether it’s a dress, a suit of armor, a heraldic device, a feast, or a tournament.
• Realize that there are many kinds of creativity and many outlets for creativity. Not only can you paint a picture or write a poem or short story, you can also make medieval clothing or armor; paint illuminated manuscripts, weave cloth, make lace, or cook a fancy subtlety. Not only can you act in a play, you can also perform a story or song in a bardic circle. And, creativity doesn’t stop once you’re no longer in school.
• See their father doing something that he loves and that they can understand. They can’t go to work with him, and if they did, they couldn’t understand what he does.
• See grownups having fun at dress-up, play-acting, arts & crafts, and board games. One of my favorite pictures from an SCA Twelfth Night Ball was that of a grown man playing backgammon with a small boy.

Learning Is Fun

Living History should show them that learning:

• Can be fun and self-directed, even for "dry" subjects like history.
• Doesn’t stop after a certain age.

Old-Fashioned Virtues

Living History can also:

• Give them a venue in which it is not unusual to be polite.
• Reinforce civic virtues of honor, courage, duty, and service.
• Reassure them that it's OK for poetry to have meter and rhyme.

Creating Context For Other Subjects

Learning works best in context. Kids will seek out or happen upon many contexts that will make them want to know more (this is why un-schooling works pretty well). Other contexts we create for them. Living History can:

• Give them a context for arts, crafts, music, dancing, etc. Crafts are not just something you do in Sunday school; dance is not just for dance class; singing is not just for hymns in church; etc.
• Give them a context and timeline for classical music. Give them a sense of the age and lineage of the ancient music in our hymnal.
• Give them a context for studying Shakespeare or Milton.
• Give them a niche market for running a small business.  This is a great way to teach math, economics, stewardship, etc.
• Give them a context for studying Latin. Between "Adeste Fideles" and gross anatomy are a lot of years when they should be building this base layer. Reading and composing mottoes is a way to lighten it up, at least.