This lesson starts with learning how communities change and ends with a field trip to the local historical society. To create relevance for these young children, the lesson will focus on how schools in the community have changed over the past 100 years. The students will research using primary documents, interviews, and other print and electronic resources. The research will be used to write a historical journal entry and to accurately participate in a reenactment of a school day at the local historical society.

Instructional Goals:

• Students will gather information from a variety of sources.
• Students will decide what information is relevant to this project.
• Students will present their information in a variety of formats.
• Students will apply the newly acquired information to a relevant situation.

 

Learning Objectives:

• Students will perform interviews, examine pictures, and read passages to extract relevant data.
• Students will decide who to interview and formulate interview questions to extract relevant data from the information source.
• Students will write a journal entry in first person narrative describing a day in the life of a one room school house.
• Students will actively participate in and significantly contribute to a two hour long real life reenactment of a day in the life of a one room school house at the local historical society.

 

Motivational Goals:

• Generate student interest in the research process.
• Interest students in thinking about life long ago.
• Encourage students to continue the research process after the project is complete.
• Generate confidence and a feeling of enthusiasim when presenting their findings.

See supporting files for lesson plan

See supporting files for lesson plan

See supporting files for lesson plan

LMS, 4th grade teacher, parent, high school consumer science class, local historical society