The Brothers’ War: Civil War in Verse by J. Patrick Lewis
I am excited that my project using Google Earth was recently published on the Google Lit Trip site for educators. The direct link and download for viewing in Google Earth can be located here:
The Brothers In War: Civil War Voices in Verse - KMZ file (downloaded and opens in Google Earth)
About the book:
This book of poems is truly amazing. J. Patrick Lewis writes eloquently, using emotionally loaded words and imagery, to speak in the voices of various Civl War participants - both real and imagined.
What I found ironic about this text are the juxtaposition of the flowing, beautiful language and the subsequent horror it was detailing. Some examples of Lewis’s powerful imagery included in The Brothers’ War are the “sickle moon” revealed during the bloody aftermath of the Battle of Seven Pines, the voice of a hospitalized Confederate soldier - “giving up the ghost To welcome Mr. Death,” a runaway slave describing his “bullwhip-long odds” of making it to freedom - ”a land as alien as space.” The Brothers’ War also includes Civil War photographs, adding visual interest to the events of the Civil War and the text. This book is a useful resource in both Language Arts and Social Studies classes.
Podcasts of letters - written from the point of view of a concerned father and a son. The son is a Confederate Prisoner of War. He writes his letter home on his way to a Union prison.
Letter from Home - Father to Son Recording - Charles Barnett, Language Arts teacher 
barnettecivilwar.mp3
Letter Home - Son to Father Recording by Cody Eldridge, 8th grade student at DR Hill civiwarcody.mp3
The Google Earth Lit Trip is located under the middle grade section: 6-8. Read the viewing session tips in order to view the event locations included in this book - also included in tour is supplementary information about the Civil War.
*You must have Google Earth installed on your computer to view the file. This should open automatically in Google Earth. Under My Places, Temporary Files, you can select the Civil War .kmz file to view the tour.
In order to read the content saved under each location and to view and hear media files, pause the tour and manually click on each underlined placemark.
I just stumbled onto your website after having already downloaded your Google Lit Trip....can't believe you haven't received a gazillion 'congratulations!' comments...so let me be the first. :) Yours will be my first time using GLT....I'm sure students will get a lot out of it. I looove your blog and links...thank you for taking the time to share your info!!
ReplyDeleteThank you so much! I really appreciate your kind words. If I can help you with the Google Lit project, just let me know! I will tell you that you will want to save often once using Google Lit. If you embed audio or video files, it can frequently stall your computer, and you will lose work as a result.
ReplyDeleteThanks again for the compliment!