Classroom Activities
Activity 1
The first activity I wish to elaborate upon is Day 6, when the students are introduced to interviewing techniques. The students will learn to thank their subjects for agreeing to be interviewed. Then, I want the students to learn how to generate questions that require the interviewee to provide more than a yes or no answer. Some suggested question stems would be: How did you…? Why did you…? What would you…? Explain… and Describe… If the students can start their questions in such a way it will foster conversation. While asking the questions seems as if it is the most important part of conducting an interview, listening is just as important. The students need to learn to listen to the responses. The interviewee may answer some questions that were also on the list or the response may lead to a follow-up question that was not on the list. The students also need to practice taking notes as opposed to trying to write down word for word responses. I plan to record the interview so students can revisit it just as reporters do today. As part of this activity I plan to provide the students with some questions that they can ask to a partner. The partner in return will read off responses and the interviewee will have to listen and take notes. I hope to allow the interviewer space to add an additional question based on the response and to also omit a question that gets answered prior to reaching it on the script. The students will switch roles, use a new script, and go through the same process. Both partners will be instructed to make eye contact throughout the interview.
Activity 2
The students will continue to hone their interview skills on Days 11-13. I envision the students working in class with partners to generate questions to ask their parents in the home interview. The students should try to find out when their home was built. What style is the house? Are there any old fixtures? Are there any fireplaces? How long has your family lived in the house? What do you know about previous owners? Are there any interesting stories about the house? Are there any interesting clues or marks on the walls, in the concrete, or in the yard? I anticipate that the students will come up with other questions that I have not anticipated. It is their interview, so I want it to reflect their personality and interests, but I want them to dig into the history of the house in particular. I may need to guide them toward some ways to identify clues to the age of the house. Once the interviews are conducted, the students will transform the information into an oral history to present to the class. I also want them to share one of their memories from their home.
Activity 3
The third activity that I want to expand upon is from Days 20-24 and is the climax of the unit. The students will be divided into cooperative groups, and each group will be given a location along the Slave Trail to research. I will have links to use posted on my website (see student resources.) The students are to discover the history of the location and I will provide a fact form to aid in gathering the facts. For each location the students need to identify the location by name and describe its location on the Slave Trail. Then they need to describe in detail why the site is important to the Slave Trade that took place in Richmond. I also want my students to discover when the location was constructed, installed (in the case of a sculpture), or recently uncovered.
Once the history is revealed, I want my students to find a personal memory related to the site. I plan to have several within my links (if available) and the students can choose the one that resonates with them. I expect my students to describe the memory as a story. They should answer the 5 W's (who, what, when, where, why) in their memory. Once the information is gathered the students will enter it into the class Prezi. Each group should include text of the history, text of the memory, and an image.
Daily Schedule Overview
Day 1
I will introduce the concepts of history and memory. The class will visit the playground with a graphic organizer and complete their brainstorming for their memory of the playground.
Days 2-3
Students will use their graphic organizer to write their rough drafts of their memory.
Days 4-5
After the rough drafts have been edited either by a peer or by the teacher, the students will work on their final draft.
Day 6
The students will learn some basic interview skills and practice with a partner. A guest from the local newspaper may visit the class to assist us. The skills will include how to ask a question that requires a more elaborate answer than a simple yes or no. The students will learn to listen as their partner answers the question and how to generate a new question based on a given response. The students will learn how to take notes and how to be courteous and grateful for the person or persons being interviewed.
Day 7
The class will work in cooperative groups, then come together as a class to compile interview questions for the "press conference."
Days 8-9
The class will individually write their history of the playground based on the information gleaned in the press conference.
Day 10
The class will share their histories to compare and contrast the content.
Day 11
Class time will be spent writing interview questions. The students will then go home and conduct interviews with their parents.
Days 12-13
Students will work in class to create their oral history and memory that will be videotaped in class. Students can also work on the oral presentations at home.
Day 14
The students' histories and memories will be videotaped.
Day 15
The class will be given a hard copy of the history of the Richmond slave trade and the memory of Henry Box Brown from this unit and a Venn diagram. The students will complete the Venn diagram by comparing and contrasting the history and the memory.
Day 16
Multiple copies of the book Henry's Freedom Box a True Story from the Underground Railroad by Ellen Levine will be used as students create a poem. One partner will have to pick out facts from the story and the other partner will write down an emotion related to the events in the story. The poems will be published and shared orally with their classmates.
Day 17
I will share the history and memory of the Lumpkin Jail. I also will share the University of Richmond's Google Earth website (see student resources) of the Shockoe Valley in 1876.
Day 18
I will share the history and the memory of the Winfree Cottage. Then the class will break into cooperative groups and will be assigned a site on the slave trail to research.
Day 19
I will take the students on a virtual field trip of the Odell building. The former power plant for tobacco warehouses has been revitalized for the modern world, but also shows how the memory of the past has been preserved. The students will be given a sketch of the Winfree Cottage and they will design the future use of the Winfree Cottage. Who knows? Maybe they will come up with an amazing idea that will become a reality.
Days 20-24
The class will work on researching their location. They will have to determine the history and a memory of the location. Each group will work on a portion of the class Prezi once their research is complete.
Day 25
The class will watch the Prezi and then we will discuss the ways blacks built Richmond.
Day 26
The class will complete a final art/math project to bring the unit to a close. Each student will be given an outline of two hands. Each student will decorate one hand to indicate in some way what the hands of slaves did in our city of Richmond. The hands may be in shackles, twisting tobacco, or shaping iron. I want the students to creatively use words or art to convey their message on the hand. The second hand will represent the student's hand and what it will do in the future. The student's hands may represent a future career, further discovery of history in the city, or an aspiration to make the invisible visible. Once all of the hands are completed they will be displayed in the form of a tessellation (a repeating pattern involving sliding, flipping, and reflecting the hands.) The project will allow for student reflection and also provide a powerful culmination that looks to the future of Richmond.
Comments: