In this modern world it can sometimes be difficult to imagine how life must have been hundreds of years ago. Staff from Camp Flintlock, Inc. camped out on Fairview Elementary School's ball fields in order to give the students an idea of life in the #1700s. The next morning the staff greeted kids as they arrived at school with guests playing the fife and drum as part of the historical experience.
“This experience allows students the opportunity to experience history,” said fourth grade teacher Katie Cheatham. “All stations are interactive and allow students to participate in activities, whereas at a museum or another type or living history location, students would only be able to watch.”
Many of the day's activities included musical lessons about the fife and drum, knot tying, Native American stories, necklace making, writing with a quill and ink, colonial clothes, and childhood games. Students really learned what life was like during the Revolutionary War.
“The instructors really valued the chance for students to try things out for themselves,” Ms. Cheatham explained. “Students dressed up as children would in the 1700s.”
This year the students have been studying the colonial period and Revolutionary War during social studies and ELA. The whole experience took what the teachers have taught in the classroom, and put the students' learning into a whole perspective as they were immersed in a different time period.
“They have studied the major figures in history and read books set during this time period,” Ms. Cheatham said. “Camp Flintlock allows students to interact with the past and experience it. It makes the lessons learned in the classroom more concrete, and the hands-on experience makes these long-ago figures of American history more real. I think the experiences truly made history come alive and made more students interested in learning history.”
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