Horses and American History

If your homeschool teacher is gonna be a travel writer, that means tons of field trips. I am trying to plan at least one field trip every week.

Right now in social studies, we are studying early American history. Horses played a big role in that. So today, we met with the Larimer County Fair and PRCA Rodeo Queen, Paige Petrocco, to learn all about Western heritage and horses. We got to meet her 3 amazing horses — each super sweet with huge personalities.

The lesson: This week, we studied early settlers in North America. One of the funniest things we learned was early, wild horses used to be just one foot tall. This LITERALLY BLOWS MY ABSOLUTE MIND. I cannot handle it. These little guys smaller than my dogs were called Eohippus. Below is evidence that I'm not just making this up.

After we processed the literal insanity of this, we learned about how the Spanish explorers eventually brought normal-sized horses to North and South America. These horses played a huge role in the exploration and settling of North America. Rather than having to walk everywhere, explorers and especially Native American tribes could hop on a horse and move around much quicker. Horses could carry supplies and pull carts. Horses also changed the way tribes battled and hunted.

Today, horses are still important in helping farmers tend to fields, rope cattle, travel and more. The rodeo and rodeo queens honor and preserve this history and the American Western traditions -- traditions that are at the heart of how this country developed into what it is today.

As part of Betty's typing, English, photography and coding education, she will be blogging about our adventures, too. Make sure to read Betty's story about our day on the ranch.