The following suggestions are starting points. Dig deeper into any
subject in which your children show an interest.
I. Up and About
1: Vocabulary: apprentice, penetrate, artisan.
What is the setting of the book? Find Boston on a map. Find Hancock's
wharf on a Boston map.
2: Vocabulary: venerable, pious.
Look up verses in the Bible about pride and humility using a topical
Bible. Do Humble Character Study.
3: Vocabulary: diligent, breeches, arrogantly.
Mr. Lapham doesn't seem to have good organizational skills. Why is it
important to remember instructions accurately? What can you do to remember
instructions? Who is Mr. Hancock?
4: Vocabulary: enormous, basin.
Look at some silver pieces. Turn them over to see the marks on them.
Design your own silversmith's mark.
5: Vocabulary: replica, wharf, kinship.
Johnny is telling tall tales about Merchant Lyte. What is a tall tale?
6: Vocabulary: twilight, evidently, strikingly.
Does your family have a crest or motto? If not, design one.
II. The Pride of Your Power
1: Vocabulary: garlands, unexpired, crucibles, slavishly.
Read a biography about Paul Revere.
2: Vocabulary: tyranny, tediously, mundane.
Mr. Lapham says that it is better to break faith with Mr. Hancock than
with the Lord. Debate this statement. Can you find Bible verses to back
your position?
3: Vocabulary: fascinated, plunged, poultice, slavishly.
Was Dove justified in trying to teach Johnny a lesson? Learn the proper
first aid procedures for a burn.
4: Vocabulary: linseed, venerable, ulceration, idleness.
How did Johnny's injury change the way he thought of idle time? How
did it change the way he saw Hancock's Wharf? Discuss how people with
disabilities should be treated.
5: Vocabulary: glint, cooper, extravagance.
Learn about the different trades of the time and choose one you think
Johnny could learn. Pretend you are Johnny and write down what you could
say to a potential master to convince him to apprentice you.
III. An Earth of Brass
1: Vocabulary: flourish, loiter, spyglass.
Choose a trade or use the one you chose in the previous exercise. Design
what the sign above the door of that shop would look like.
2: Vocabulary: bachelor, clasp, gumption.
Discuss name calling. How much damage can it do?
3: Vocabulary: rakish, perpendicular, mortgage.
4: Vocabulary: tormented, squab, hysterical.
Did Johnny use his money wisely?
5: Vocabulary: orchard, penthouse, cobbles.
Trace the route on a Boston map.
IV. The Rising Eye
1: Vocabulary: ruddy, sanctuary, quivered.
2: Vocabulary: exuberant, translucent.
Find out what the Stamp Act was.
3: Vocabulary: spinet, suited, apparition.
What were jails like in the 1770's?
4: Vocabulary: turnkey, imposter, perturbed.
Learn more about the Sons of Liberty.
5: Vocabulary: passionate, indenture, sensation.
How was a court room different then from today?
V. The Boston Observer
1: Vocabulary: noble, courtly, suave.
What do you think of Mr. Lyte's character?
2: Vocabulary: stirrup, reveled, opposition.
Read about learning how to ride a horse.
3: Vocabulary: yoke, gumption, residence.
4: Vocabulary: prophesies, customary, imperturbable.
How did Johnny's personality change? Was it a good change? What unexpected
benefits did it bring?
VI. Salt-Water Tea
While reading this next section, complete the Boston
Tea Party Lapbook.
1: Vocabulary: inflammatory, habitually, wiry.
2: Vocabulary: tyranny, shillings
3: Vocabulary: consignees, grievances, assembled.
4: Vocabulary: nerveless.
5: Vocabulary: persevered, treasonable, enchantment.
6: Vocabulary: countersign, utterly, seized.
VII. The Fiddler's Bill
1: Vocabulary: paroxysm, gesticulating, provincials.
Finish the consequences part of the lapbook.
2: Vocabulary: inhabitants, tyrant, forlorn
Find out about the Minute Men. Where did they train? What did they wear?
What were their weapons like?
3: Vocabulary: territory, sidling, commandeer.
What can you find out about spies during the Revolutionary War?
4: Vocabulary: hypocrite, threshold, suet.
What did Johnny learn about revenge and holding a grudge?
5: Vocabulary: monstrous, impudent, contradict.
Compare the character qualities of Miss Lavinia, Isannah and Cillia.
VIII. A World to Come
1: Vocabulary: befitted, chaise.
2: Vocabulary: generations, genealogy, bayonet.
Johnny finds his family tree. Look at your family tree, or start writing
down your own.
3: Vocabulary: friction, hilarity.
4: Vocabulary: piqued, quarrel.
5: Vocabulary: placate, refugee.
What is the Continental Congress?
IX. The Scarlet Deluge
1: Vocabulary: befuddled, allay
Find out how much spying helped the Whig's cause.
2: Vocabulary: enmity, cultivate, garrulous.
3: Vocabulary: stoically, flogging.
Find out about the weapons most of the Minute Men had compared to the
British weapons.
4: Vocabulary: provincials, dilatory, ferocious.
5: Vocabulary: ravenously, inadequacy.
Find out what both armies did to deserters.
X. 'Disperse, Ye Rebels!'
1: Vocabulary: grenadier, florid, ardor.
2: Vocabulary: disconsolately, glumly.
3: Vocabulary: jubilee, flasks.
4: Vocabulary: punctilious, dilapidated, embarkation.
Read about Paul Revere's midnight ride.
XI. Yankee Doodle
1: Vocabulary: haggard, lenient.
Read about the Battle at Lexington.
2: Vocabulary: inhabitants, shrewder, animosity.
3: Vocabulary: glibly, jubilation, skulking.
4: Vocabulary: insurrection, chisel, diffidently.
5: Vocabulary: impersonating, mischievously.
XII. A Man Can Stand Up
1: Vocabulary skirmish.
Learn about the medical practices of the 1770's. How did they heal their
wounded?
2: Vocabulary: munitions.
3: Vocabulary: belfry, surfeited.
4: Vocabulary: jumbled, disconsolately.
5: Vocabulary: elegant, unalterably.
Read more about the Revolutionary War.
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