Christine Y. House
The English explorers who came to North America in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were indeed a courageous lot of folk. They set out on precarious sailing vessels to cross a treacherous ocean to arrive in unknown territory and meet a strange breed of people who neither spoke their language nor had any knowledge of their culture. One wonders what compels an individual to undertake such a journey and what comparable adventures are available to today’s voyagers. Is it space flight for which one needs an advanced degree in engineering or another specialty field.
And what of the natives who lived on these shores? What must they ahave thought of these strange men? Where were their women and children? Everything about them must have seemed amazing. Where did they come from and what did they want? Didn’t they know that this was Powhatan territory?
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1. Conduct a discussion with the students posing such questions as are suggested above. Encourage them to put themselves in the place of both the English and Indians and consider how they might have felt under these circumstances and how they might have reacted when meeting the strangers..
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2. Divide the students into groups representing the major characters in this drama, such as Pocahontas, Powhatan, John Smith, Captain Christopher Newport, Sir Edward Wingfield. Add lesser players, such as the cabin boy and a sailor from the ship the Susan Constant as well as one of Powhatan’s wives and a medicine man or a brother of Powh atan. Ask the students create a dialogue about the events of the journey or the encounter between this character and and a “television” interviewer. Prepare an interview which can be videotaped or just presented to another class. This activity can include creating period costumes for the “talent.”
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Consider such questions as :
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How did Pocahontas feel in English clothing?
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(to the cabin boy) What did you eat during your voyage to Virginia?
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(to one of the Indians) Why don’t you wear more clothing?
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(to one of the sailors) Why do you wear so much clothing?
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(to John Smith) Why did you wait so long to contact your friend Pocahontas after she arrived in London?
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3. Equipment for videotaping can be borrowed from a public access cable broadcast studio or from other sources. If it is borrowed from a public access studio, the finished tape will be broadcast on that station which is always fun for the students. There might even be students from one of the high schools or colleges who might be willing to assist with the videotaping, editing and other technical aspects of this project.
