The Renaissance Faire
It’s time to start planning for the Renaissance Faire (Friday, April 24), a colorful, educational culmination of this year’s Social Studies curriculum.
Along with the Research Paper, the Renaissance Faire Project is your most important project this year, so plan to invest plenty of time in planning and preparation. This is not the kind of project that can be left until the last minute!
You will be evaluated on three different components of your participation in the Faire:
10 pts Strolling Character – From the moment you arrive at the Faire, you will be in character. If your research paper is about a person, he or she should probably be your character for the Faire. If your paper is not about a single person, you will need to create a character that will best suit the Renaissance theme and your booth/activity. Part of being “in character” means using Renaissance language and manners – doing so will reflect positively on your grade, and bring authenticity to the Faire.
10 pts Costume – Your costume should be creative (preferably created/assembled by you rather than bought or rented), authentic (see the links on my page regarding Renaissance costume), and appropriate to your character.
30 pts Booth – You will plan a booth or activity that “brings alive” some aspect of your research paper topic for our guests at the faire. See the research paper page at macspage.com to get ideas of possible booths that correspond to your paper topic. Similar booths will be grouped together at the Faire, and you may choose to work with one or more people with similar paper topics on a collaborative booth/activity. Each group member will be held responsible for the specific aspects of the booth that they signed up to complete (on the final page of this handout).
When planning your booth/activity, consider:
Are you going to make products to sell to Faire guests, like manuscripts or spices?
Are you going to create and display models or artwork, like models of DaVinci’s inventions, or a telescope?
Are you going to decorate your booth to recreate a historical place, like a cathedral or the Sistine Chapel?
Are you going to provide your guests a service, like a medieval medical check-up?
Are you going to do a performance for your guests, like a poetry reading or a puppet show?
Are you going to allow your guests to take part in an activity, like carving soap sculptures?
Renaissance Faire Planning Worksheet
Booth Ideas and Research Paper Topics
Costume Resources
History of Costume - Braun and Schneider
Women's Dress from Renaissance Paintings
Notable Renaissance Costume Elements
Food Resources
Medieval and Renaissance Recipes
Renaissance Faire Speech
A Guide to Speech and Vocabulary
Booth Ideas
