Web Dropin #2

Mark Twain in 1895
Courtesy The Mark Twain House, Hartford

To begin our unit on the novel Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, you will do independent research on Samuel Clemens/Mark Twain’s life. To make this activity a bit more fun, you are going to complete your research by playing Mark Twain’s Memory-Builder. Mark Twain designed and patented a memory building game in 1885 and you will play a game based loosely on his original design to learn interesting facts about his life.

Assignment: (Read ALL Directions Before Beginning!!!)

1. Have your “Mark Twain: Timeline and Influences” worksheet handy and ready to fill out.

2. Visit Mark Twain’s Memory-Builder by clicking on the link above.

3. Click “Start Playing”, and the game will begin. Click on “Question One” to view the first question.

4. To answer the question, you will click on one of the decades provided.

5. If you answer the question incorrectly, a person from Mark Twain’s life will “tell” you a bit about his/her relationship with Twain and redirect you to choose another answer. ***Each time you answer a question incorrectly, record the name of the person that appears on the screen under the “Influences” section of your worksheet and briefly write down his/her relationship with Mark Twain. You must have at least FOUR names recorded on your sheet. If you answer every question correctly (excellent job!), repeat the game and choose incorrect answers to learn more about these important influences on Twain’s life.

6. When you answer a question correctly, write down the information you have learned in the proper location on your timeline. ***Put the basic fact (the direct question from the game) on the top line and the interesting facts (other tidbits of information given in the answer) on the bottom lines provided on the worksheet.

7. You will update your timeline and influences on the worksheet for each of the 8 questions.

8. When you have finished all 8 questions and recorded the appropriate information on your worksheet, click on “To Landing”. Does the top line of your timeline match the facts in order? Do your “interesting” facts on the bottom line correspond appropriately to the facts on the top?