If your children ask to wear a peg leg and carry a bottle of rum to school, don't be alarmed. Today is International Talk Like a Pirate Day. It was started in 1995 by Mark "Cap'n Slappy" Summers and John "Ol' Chumbucket" Baur. Personally, I think it was just an excuse for two grown men to play dress up and entice women to sport corsets.
Schools and many businesses get in on the fun. You can, too. Here are free printable pirate coloring pages, crafts, games and toys. Side-stepping the less savory aspects of pirate lore, I've included navigation, maritime and marine lesson plans, too. That way teachers and home-school parents can indulge their inner pirate and call it educational.
* Disney "Pirates of the Caribbean" coloring pages: No Pirate Day is complete without a nod to POTC. Not since "Treasure Island" have pirates come into vogue. Johnny Depp gave a memorable and oft-imitated Capt. Jack Sparrow, but my favorite pirate was Geoff Rush as Barbossa.
* Boat-Links is subtitled "The Mother of All Maritime Links," and it's rightly named. The site is a comprehensive collection of hundreds of resources about nautical science, navigation, sailing, maritime history, merchant marine, the U.S. Navy, naval history in other countries, naval warfare, maritime museums around the world, nautical music and boat images.
* Celestial Navigation. Before modern navigation, pirates and sailors relied on the sky to guide voyages. Ancient instruments such as the sextant, astrolabe, cross-staff, quadrant, kamal (latitude hook) and nocturnal were indispensable. This site shows how to make navigational tools.
* Boats, Ships and Subs has dozens of links for free printable paper boat models. There are sailing vessels from all periods in history, including clipper ships, Chinese junks, Roman warships, Coast Guard boats, viking long boats, pirate ships and models of the Titanic and Thor Heyerdahl's Kon-Tiki.
* Digital Navy has several scale-model sailing vessels to print. There is a cruiser, Dreadnought, lightship and mine sweeper.
* Disney Experience has free printable nautical toys and crafts from maritime-themed movies. There's a Spanish galleon, Capt. Nemo's Nautilus, Jack Sparrow's compass, dead man's chest, Cortez's treasure chest, a Mark Twain riverboat and several other models.
* The Toymaker has a free printable puppet theater in which children can act out the adventures of Florimel the Magnificent. Florimel is a rabbit sailor who has adventures on the high seas in his "Golden Hind" inspired sailing ship.
* Coloring Pages for Boys has dozens of realistic free printable coloring pages of boats, ships and submarines for many periods in history. There are also coloring pages of pirate ships.
Marilisa Kinney Sachteleben writes from 23 years parenting four children and 25 years teaching K-8, special needs, adult education and home-school.
4 comments