Visit a museum

Use the materials gathered while doing project work on famous dynasties. Open an exhibition dedicated to the people, prepared by the people, displayed for the people.

A STUDY OF HERALDRY

Working individually, design a coat-of-arms for your family. Just like in the days long gone. Display all of them in class.

CALIFORNIA GOES HUNTING

by Karen Cushman

I. Pre-reading

1.1 SHARE your family history with the group. Say whether you, together with your family, had to move east or west once in your life. Did it take you long to adjust to a new environment?

1.2 DISCUSS the problem of living in a foreign country for a period long enough to start thinking about home. Do you think you can (or could) combat homesickness? Are you (were you) cultural shockproof ? Work in pairs.

1.3 SHARE your visions of life in the Wild West sometime in the 1850s. Say where your ideas mostly come from: movies, books, or — well, other movies?

II. Reading

2.1. Understanding the title.

Here is the title of the story, California Goes Hunting. Do you think it's a tall tale in the style of Nutty Bumppo cycle? Tell your partner what you expect to read about in the story.

2.2. Strange Names.

Read the introduction to the story. Think about the names of children. What can one say about their parents?

California Morning Whipple's parents have always had a hankering to move west from their home in Massachusetts. When California's pa dies, her mama packs the whole family — California, her brother Butte, and her sisters Prairie and Sierra — and heads to the gold fields of California to manage a boardinghouse in Lucky Diggins. But California, who would much rather be called Lucy, is desperate to return east and live with her gram and grampop, where life is safe and civilized.

2.3. Reading for pleasure and enrichment.

Now read on. Be prepared to say if your idea of California's personality was right.

The following words will be helpful to understand the events better.

Relish — enjoy the thought of something yet to happen

Shove (into) — put something somewhere carelessly

Fret (about) — feel worried about things, usually

Spook —unimportant frighten, make someone feel afraid

Venture— risk doing something

Streak – a part of somebody's character

If you want to eat, missy, you are going to have to find a way to put food on this table," said Mama, sweeping at my feet with her broom.

Lord-a-mercy, I thought, fixing Mama with my fiercest glare. Don't I do enough what with helping to cook and wash for all those hairy strangers in the bunks in the back tent? Don't I teach Prairie her letters, her numbers, and a little about the history of Massachusetts each morning? Isn't that enough?

"Not nearly enough," said Mama, as if reading my mind. She snatched Ivanhoe from my hands and tossed it into the soapy water of the laundry tub. With a yelp I fished it out and spread it in the sunshine to dry. I expected it would soon be as good as new except for some wrinkled pages, but I decided I'd better take Mama seriously.

"What do you want me to do, Mama?"

"Take this shotgun and shoot us some rabbits or a squirrel. "But Mama, I can't go shooting little animals!" I didn't relish the idea of shooting living things. I was much too sensitive, and the powder would make my hands stink.

"Don't Mama me. What do you think stew is? And bacon? Meat. From animals. Butte can't hunt, now he has his job with Mr. Scatter, so you will have to do it."

"Couldn't we just buy meat from the store?"

"One, Mr. Scatter doesn't get much meat. Two, what he does get is too darned expensive. Three, I have a perfectly able daughter with a perfectly good trigger finger."

"Prairie doesn't do anything but watch Sierra and pull weeds. She could hunt."

"Prairie is only six. It will have to be you. I can't feed three hungry boarders and the five of us on beans and the bits of salt pork and dried beef Bean Belly Thompson hauls in from Sacramento every few weeks. Now go."

Mama shoved the shotgun into my hands and pushed me out the door quick as a cat.

My pa had taught me and Butte to shoot back home, but I never took to it, preferring a book any day to the jolt and noise and smell of shooting. Now Pa was dead, and we had come west and Mama was trying to make a westerner out of me.

The first morning I sat on a stump outside the tent and fretted. The place was so wild, just trees and hills and tents. I could almost see wild Indians coming up the Sacramento River to the Yuba and up the Yuba to the Forks and on to Lucky Diggins, right to where I sat on the stump with a gun in my lap.

Near noon I saw a movement in the dry grass. It looked like feathers. Indians! I bolted into the tent.

"I had to come back, Mama," I said. "I saw feathers and..."

"I know, I know," said Mama. "They were wild Indians and you were in imminent danger of being captured and living the rest of your life on acorns and roasted grasshoppers."

"But Mama..."

"But Mama nothing. That was most likely a wild turkey you let get away." Mama sighed. "Go feed Prairie and Sierra."

That night we had no meat for supper. I, in fact, had no supper at all and wouldn't, so Mama said, until I brought home something to eat.

I watched the rest eat their beans and biscuits. "If I were with Gram," I muttered, "I would be eating chicken from Larrabee's farm or store-bought bacon."

Mama said nothing.

The second day I sat three hours on the tree stump with the gun in my lap, imagining myself as the dashing Ivanhoe's secret love, as beautiful as Rowena and as plucky as Rebecca but much smarter and better read.

Suddenly there was a rustling in the grass. "Mama!" I ran for the tent. "There's something out there. Sounded like a grizzly or..."

Mama banged the skillet down on the cook stove. "Lord, you are the spookiest child. When you were little, wind spooked you. Lantern light blinking in the window spooked you. The clown at Hallelujah Purdy's Circus and Hippodramatic Exposition spooked you." She picked up a spoon and waved it at me. "Now you're near grown up, you've gotten worse instead of better. Grizzlies! Indians! Won't shoot a gun! Want to lie around with your nose in a book! What is to become of you, girl?" Mama plopped a gob of bacon grease into the skillet and shook her head. "Every tub has to learn to stand on its own bottom sometime."

I got no supper again, but I must allow that in a curious way I was proud of myself. I might starve to death, but I'd go a NeW Englander. .

The third day I ventured off the stump. I watched a blue jay gather buckeyes from a tree overhanging the ravine, followed a lizard as it skittled from sunny spot to sunny spot, made shadow pictures of a fox, a duck, and a swan on the canvas of the tent.

Finally, hungry and afraid to push Mama any further, I closed nay eyes, pulled the trigger a few times, and, lo and behold, shot a squirrel. It was blasted near to pieces and no good for anyone to eat except a dog or a coyote, but I took it into the tent, dropped it on the table, and lay down on ray bed to read Ivanhoe.

"I plan to rent out your bed," said Mama, "to someone who will pay for it. Kindly remove your carcass."

At that I realized Mama's stubborn streak was a mile wider and a good deal deeper than mine. I sat outside the cabin day after day shooting rabbits and squirrels and any wild creature that moved until I discovered that I didn't mind killing birds as much, so we ate prairie chicken every day and would, I said, until someone else agreed to do the hunting. Jimmy Whiskers said prairie chicken with biscuits and lard gravy didn't taste bad at all, but the buckshot sure was hard on his gums.

2.4. True or false?

1. Moving west was an unwelcome change for the girl.

2. The girl's mother was a sensible, practically-minded woman.

3. California was glad to get some life experience while hunting.

4. All other family members were dying to go hunting, too.

5. California gave in for fear of severe punishment.

6. Hunting turned out to be quite an occupation for the girl.

2.5. Understanding points of view.

Scan the story and try to explain what the characters meant.

California, "Mama was trying to make a Westerner out of me."

Mother, "What is to become of you, girl?"

California, "I may starve to death, but I'd go a New Englander."

Mother, "Don't Mama me!"

Mother, "When you were little, wind spooked you."

Mother, "Every tub has to learn to stand on its own bottom sometime."

Mother, "I have a perfectly able daughter with a perfectly good trigger finger."

2.6. Storing vocabulary.

Paraphrase the following using the expressions from the story.

1. The kids ran into the room shouting happily.

2. He was very romantic, being in love with poetry and beauty.

3. It was a frightening story, so I wouldn't read it again for love or money.

4. You'll have to think of a way to raise the sum of money you need.

5. It's hard to like her, she's a snob, and thinks too much of herself.

6. The class was silent, as nobody risked going to the blackboard.

7. We didn't think much about our winnings; it looked like we were just being lucky, nothing more.

8. Whatever your difficulty might be, you can always cope with it.

Choose from: to venture, to bolt into, to find a way, to have a ... streak, spooky, to take to.

2.7.GRAMMAR.

California seems to have great powers of imagination. When alone in the wild, she could almost see Indians coming. What about her other fears? The table below will help you speak about them.

California

could almost see

a grizzly bear colored feathers coyotes hungry wolves

What was the girl actually able to see happen or happening?

2.8. More grammar.

California disagreed with her mother a lot. Yet she finally decided she'd better take Mummy seriously. For her own sake, she'd better do some other things, too. Give her some advice, please.

Girl you'd better _________________________________________________________