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Attention homeschool historians, geographers, artists, and treasure hunters! Here’s something new for you to search for this month: the War in the Pacific National Historical Park “America the Beautiful” quarter from Guam, just out from the U.S. Mint:
Click for image: riverhouses.org/2019-guam-quarter
If you’re looking for a fun and easy way to include some interesting geographical and historical facts in your homeschool schedule (as well as a little treasure hunting along the way), you can’t do better than to keep an eye on the “America the Beautiful” quarters series. This commemorative series began in 2010 and each year five new designs are issued featuring national parks and other historic sites in the U.S. states and territories.
The latest quarter commemorates the War in the Pacific National Historical Park in Guam, and it has just gone into circulation:
“The westernmost park of all the National Park Service sites, Guam’s War in the Pacific National Historical Park honors the bravery, courage, and sacrifice of those participating in the campaigns of the Pacific Theater during World War II. The park also conserves and interprets a variety of amazing resources found on the Island of Guam. War in the Pacific National Historical Park has the highest biological diversity of any national park, with both underwater and land areas. This design depicts American forces coming ashore at Asan Bay, strengthening the number of troops on the island in the fight for Guam and its eventual liberation.“ (U.S. Mint)
The Mint has a remarkably comprehensive set of free lesson plans available for the whole America the Beautiful series — you could make quite an American history course out of them. And the Mint also has a very nice simple album for this series (amzn.to/2D2A3dO) — just the thing to get some educational treasure hunting under way.
(And next up, if you want to look ahead: a quarter for the San Antonio Missions National Historical Park in Texas, scheduled for late August.)
What numismatical discoveries have you made in your homeschool this week? 😊
❡ Come, here’s the map: The America the Beautiful quarters are a great tool for teaching about geography. Locate each park and each historic site in your homeschool atlas (riverhouses.org/books) and spread out your whole collection across its pages. 🇺🇸
❡ Explore more: These quarters are great for teaching history, too. For an overview of World War II in the Pacific, with a map featuring the location of Guam, turn to page 402 in your homeschool history encyclopedia (riverhouses.org/books). 🇬🇺
❡ Make it a tradition: Why not pick up an old roll of circulated quarters at your local grocery store or bank each week and invite your students to go through it around the kitchen table. A whole world of historical and geographical discovery awaits them. 💰
