Our February 4 Home School Day will explore a New England winter. Warm up by the fire as you cook a receipt over the open hearth, participate in winter chores, and learn about winter pastimes. In honor of Black History Month, some of the workshops and tours during this Home School Day will feature information about 19th-century African American figures in New England, from recipes to craft traditions.

Home School Days offer you and your family the opportunity to explore the Village and participate in activities. From games, to woodworking, to nature exploration, this is a great opportunity for kids to gain exposure to many aspects of 1830s New England life in an interactive way.

Admission and Ticketing

On Home School Day, homeschoolers (ages 4-17) get in at the discounted rate $10 and one adult is admitted per home school youth at the discounted rate of $15. Additional adults above the 1 to 1 ratio are admitted at the full rate of $28. As always, members get into the Village for free.

Click here to purchase/reserve tickets for February 4, 2022

Timed In-Person Programs (subject to change)

Things to know:

• Unless otherwise noted, all of the workshops listed below will take place inside the Museum Education building. Masks are required in Museum Education, without exception.
• Please let us know as soon as possible if you need to cancel your workshop tickets. There is a high demand for these workshops and we would like to be able to offer spots to other participants. You can contact us at osved@osv.org.
• Pre-registration is required for all activities listed below, unless otherwise noted.
• All events are limited to 10 students due to restrictions on group size.
• These are not drop-in programs and our staff will have a list of registrants for each workshop.
• Participants may park and enter the Village either through the main VIsitor Center or Museum Education.
• Students’ guardians must stay in close proximity of the program location for the entire duration of the activity for safety reasons.
• Meeting locations for these workshops may change. Stay tuned to your email or signage at the Visitor Center on the day of the program for any potential location changes.
• Workshop times are approximate. Please stay close by during your child’s workshop.

Open-Hearth Cooking: Making Akara (Black-Eyed Pea Fritters) | 50 Minutes | $5 per student

Register for 10:00 (Ages 8+) SOLD OUT
Register for 11:00 (Ages 6+) SOLD OUT
Register for 1:00 (Ages 10+) SOLD OUT

Together, we will make Akara, a fried snack made from black-eyed peas. It is a West African recipe that was prepared by enslaved cooks in the 18th and 19th centuries. While our fritters cook, we will look at The House Servant’s Directory by Robert Roberts, which is considered to be the first cookbook written by an African American. Ingredients will include: black-eyed peas, onion, vegetable oil, salt, and pepper

Learn to Weave | 50 Minutes | $5 per student

Register for 10:00 (Ages 10+) SOLD OUT
Register for 11:00 (Ages 6+) SOLD OUT
Register for 1:00 (Ages 8+) SOLD OUT

Learn about the different fabrics people used in the 1830s for clothing, then try your hand at carding wool and weaving on a loom.

Printing and Paper Marbling | 50 Minutes | $5 per student

Register for 10:00 (Ages 6+) SOLD OUT
Register for 11:00 (Ages 8+) SOLD OUT

Learn about the printing trade in the 1830s. Activities include making your own unique piece of marbled paper, using a printing press, and writing with a quill pen. Participants will also take a look at the lives of prominent Black writers and hear the story of David Ruggles, printer and proprietor of the country’s first Black-owned bookstore in 1834.

Making a Ball Invitation | 50 Minutes | $5 per student

Register for 1:00 (Ages 8+) SOLD OUT
Register for 2:00 (Ages 8+)

Balls were a popular form of winter entertainment in the 1830s. Some balls even celebrated George Washington’s February birthday! We will look at ball invitations from OSV’s collections, learn about the printing trades in the 1800s, and then design and create our own ball invitations using modern woodblock printing methods.

Stories and Crafts: Sew a Cookbook | 50 Minutes | $5 per student

Register for 10:00 (Ages 5+) SOLD OUT

After reading the story Mr. Crum’s Potato Predicament, a tale about the African American chef who invented the first potato chip in the 1850s, participants in this workshop will take a look at some period cookbooks. Then, we’ll sew our own cookbooks and get them started with one of the Village’s best receipts.

Stories and Crafts: Making Pottery | 50 Minutes | $5 per student

Register for 11:00 (Ages 5+) SOLD OUT

Together, we’ll read the story Dave the Potter, about an enslaved man who was also a gifted artisan. We will talk about how the Village’s potters make redware vessels and then make our own ceramic goods from air-dry clay.

Stories & Crafts Schooling in the 1800s | 50 Minutes | $5 per student

Register for 1:00 (Ages 5+) SOLD OUT

We will read the story The Oldest Student: How Many Walker Learned to Read, about a formerly enslaved woman who learns that you’re never too old to learn something new. After the story, we’ll learn a little about education for Black and White kids in the 1830s, look at schoolbooks, and practice our penmanship with quill pens.

Collage Portraits | 50 Minutes | $5 per student

Register for 10:00 (Ages 8+)
Register for 11:00 (Ages 6+)

For this workshop, we will take inspiration from a female portrait painter of the 1830s, Ruth Henshaw Bascom, to create portraits. Pastel and pencil self-portraits will be embellished with paper, foil, and ribbons. We’ll also look at some of Bascom’s portraits of New Englanders from the time period!

Fence Building | 50 Minutes | $5 per student 

Register for 10:00 (Ages 10+) SOLD OUT
Register for 11:00 (Ages 8+) SOLD OUT
Register for 1:00 (Ages 6+) SOLD OUT

Winter on the farm means preparing wood and repairing fences. We will flex our muscles and work to put together a fence, auger holes, and split wood. While working, we will highlight all the simple machines we have utilized. After all that hard work, we’ll make a seed packet to take home for spring planting.

Paint a Tin Tray | 50 Minutes | $7 per student

Register for 1:00 (Ages 8+) SOLD OUT
Register for 2:00 (Ages 10+)

Painted tin was a very popular form of decorative art, found in many homes in the 1830s. Young women could earn money by free-hand painting or stenciling patterns onto tinware. In this workshop, each participant will get a tin tray to embellish with flowers, fruits, leaves, and more!

Make a Quilt Square | 50 Minutes | $5 per student

Register for 10:00 (Ages 8+) SOLD OUT
Register for 11:00 (Ages 10+)
Register for 1:00 (Ages 6+)

Join a Museum Educator to learn a little about quilts. We will learn about Gee’s Bend quilts, a textile tradition from an isolated African-American hamlet in Alabama that has existed since the 19th century. We will also look at quilts from OSV’s collections and then make our own quilt square from fabric and fabric pens.

Candles and Tin Candleholder | 50 Minutes | $7 per student

Register for 10:00 (Ages 8+) SOLD OUT
Register for 11:00 (Ages 8+) SOLD OUT
Register for 1:00 (Ages 8+) SOLD OUT

Making candles was a dreaded winter task. Craft a small candleholder out of tin and make a set of hand-dipped candles to go along with it. We will learn about the different types of lighting that people used in the 1830s and experiment to see which one is brightest.

Walking Tour: Uncomfortable Truths: Slavery and New England | 50 Minutes | $5 per student

MEETS AT THE FENNO HOUSE

Register for 10:30 (Ages 12+)

This walking tour will explore the stories of how slavery began, evolved, and ended in New England, and how its legacy endures.

Walking Tour: Uncomfortable truths: Negotiating race in early New England | 50 Minutes | $5 per student

MEETS AT THE FENNO HOUSE

Register for 11:30 (Ages 12+)

In this tour we will discuss some stories of triumph and tragedy in early 19th-century New England.

Make a Toolbox | 90 Minutes | $10 per student

Register for 10:00 (Ages 10+) SOLD OUT

Practice some basic woodworking skills while making a simple and useful toolbox! Try out several implements on your own and learn about tool safety.

Extended cooking: Winter Tea Party | 90 Minutes | $10 per student

Register for 1:00 (Ages 10+) SOLD OUT

Participants will work together to make soft gingerbread to enjoy with herbal tea.  While the treats are baking, we will talk about what people in the 1830s ate during a long winter and how they kept that food from spoiling.  Set the table and learn about dining customs as you enjoy your tea and dessert. Ingredients include: flour, ginger, baking soda, butter, cream, molasses, mint tea