Times Have Changed

Activity can be done anywhere.

Gentle Rain: My family learned how to adapt and survive at Mesa Verde by using what nature provided. Because of this, my life at Mesa Verde was very different from your everyday life. At a young age, children helped with daily chores. We didn’t go to school, but we learned valuable life lessons everyday. We learned how to grow crops, hunt, make pottery, and build houses with mud and stone. We gathered materials from our surroundings to make what we needed. We also learned about our history through stories told by our grandparents.

Directions—Discover how we lived in Mesa Verde by completing the following activities for your age group.

Draw a line from each item in the left column (things we use or do today) with an item in the right column (things the Ancestral Pueblo people used or did then.)

Now Then

A.

B.

C.

D.

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The boxes list items used by Ancestral Pueblo people at Mesa Verde. Read the items in each box, then use the blanks beside the box to write the name of the natural resource used to make everything in the box. One is started for you. (Hint: Answers are in the 10-up activity word list below.)

To learn more about Gentle Rain’s life in Mesa Verde, fill in the blanks to read the following story. If you have little brothers or sisters, they might like to hear the story when you are done. (Use the word list to fill in the blanks and complete the story.)

clay

corn

hand

kivas

metates

pinyon

pottery

rabbits

seep

turkey

yucca

My family and I live in a stone room of a cliff dwelling. The people of my village wake up very early and start cooking fires in the rooms and courtyards. Every morning, my mother goes to collect water from the nearest

spring while I feed the turkeys.

As soon as the morning meal is eaten, the men and boys climb up the cliff face using

and toe holds to reach the fields. Spring days are spent clearing the fields and planting

, beans, and squash. Corn is our most important crop. The women use manos and

to grind the corn into meal. But for now, my mother is teaching my younger sister how to make

from

. We use it for cooking, and storing food and water.

Throughout the year, the men hunt mule deer and

, while children help the women gather wild plants, such as nuts from the

pine trees, grains from ricegrass, and pads from the prickly pear cactus. Much of this food is stored for the winter. We also collect

leaves to pound into fibers to make rope, sandals, and baskets. My father weaves

feathers with yucca fibers to make blankets for the winter.

When the

are not used for ceremonies, we spend time in these warm, underground rooms listening to the stories of our people, or working on crafts such as weaving, basketry, and making tools.

No matter the time of the year, my people are busy with the daily tasks needed to survive in Mesa Verde.

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