Sixth Grade Iditarod Unit
Today’s Iditarod actually began a long time ago in
1925. It wasn’t a race for fun, but a
race against death. Nome was threatened
with a diphtheria epidemic and the only serum was in an Anchorage
clinic. Because it was winter and
flying was too dangerous in the early pioneer days, it was decided that the
serum should be sent by train to Nenana and then relayed by dogteam from there
to Nome. All together it took 20
mushers and 19 dog teams to ferry the serum to Nome, saving lives and creating
history.
In 1973, the Iditarod Race
as we know it began. The Iditarod Trail
is approximately 1,149 miles of rugged, beautiful and sometimes dangerous
terrain. There are two separate
routes-a Northern Route
(even-numbered years) and a Southern Route
(odd-numbered years). There are 26
checkpoints along the trail where mushers sign in a pick up supplies and
sometimes rest. Each team must take a
mandatory 24-hour rest somewhere along the trail.
Topics on Alaska:
Topics
on the Iditarod:
Musher Logs
One
of the main components of this unit will involve keeping track of one of the
2004 mushers in a musher log. You will create and keep a
daily
log for your musher that includes the following:
current standing and place
(daily)
number
of dogs
daily news that involves your musher
This
will need to be written in first person.
For daily log samples, click
here.
Reading
We
will be reading a short story called “Benny’s Flag” that tells
about
the origin of the Alaskan
flag. The novel, “Black
Star, Bright
Dawn” by Scott
Odell, will be the book we will read during this unit.