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See the Turkey Run
Judith Leibner
Bonnie Bracey, Long Branch Elementary School, Arlington, Virginia
Subject: Social Studies
Grade: 5
"Photography was an incentive for children to put stories
together, to sequence learning activities and to make flow charts....Photographs
enabled our students to share their experiences effectively."
Purpose and Description of Project
A group of 55 fifth graders participated in a three-day living
experience at a working 18th century farm as a follow-up to their
study of Colonial history. The project was multidisciplinary in
that it involved not only social studies concepts but also reading,
research, language, writing, photography, and even handicraft
skills. It was carefully designed to enable students to perceive
the history study they had just completed in a larger framework.
Activities
After brainstorming about life in the 18th century and discussing
photographs as a means of documenting the project, the students
developed a checklist of field trips and activities. The girls
sewed colonial costumes with the help of parent volunteers, and
everyone helped cook several typical colonial foods at school
to take to the farm. In social studies they examined the roles
of men, women, and children, education, slavery, and religion
in 18th century society, and compiled charts based on their research
that showed how colonists met their basic needs for food, shelter,
and clothing and the roles technology, values, customs, and religion
played in their lives. In reading and language classes, they wrote
compositions and researched the occupations of the times. Historical
fiction and biographies gave students an even greater feeling
for the period. Finally, students developed their
photography skills
to record the field trip and to provide photos to serve
as the basis for original stories. Preliminary small-group field
trips prepared the students for the three-day trip. During each
of these short field trips, students recorded activities on
film
to share with the entire class.
Students participated in the logistical planning for the trip
as they estimated the food that would be needed and planned the
purchases. They also scheduled activities and chores for each
student while at the farm. During the field trip, students role-played
the lives of poor colonists as they slept on straw beds in linen
tents, drew their own water, chopped wood, and cooked over an
open pit. Workshops gave them the opportunity to make corn husk
and dried apple dolls, baskets, wood carvings, and patchwork squares.
They were even visited by the First Virginia Regiment, who talked
to the students as if they were troops in Washington's army that
were just passing by, and an "indentured servant girl,"
who sang songs and told stories. Each student kept a personal
journal of the events as if he or she were a colonial child.
Back in the classroom, students wrote essays and poems which were
combined with their drawings and photos into a magazine describing
their Colonial living experience.
Materials, Resources, and Expenses
Judith Leibner and Bonnie Bracey felt the greatest resources,
in addition to Turkey Run Farm and the various other museums and
nature centers they visited, were the volunteers and paid professionals
who shared their expertise with the students. Parents also helped
plan the major trip, and six actually accompanied the group; others
helped by supplying film, sewing costumes, and doing the necessary
shopping.
Outcomes and Adaptability
The activities in this project required students to develop a
variety of skills-research, scientific inquiry, expository writing,
role playing, cooperation, organization, and photography. The
overall project was successful in that it used all these factors
to produce the desired result: students obtained greater insight
into American history and culture and they developed a framework
into which they could integrate the isolated facts and concepts
they had learned as they studied the late 18th century.
The Colonial living experience provided excellent motivation,
and photography in particular was an important incentive as well
as an excellent means of sharing experiences.
Leibner and Bracey found that "for students who are "visual"
learners, photographs provided a chance to gain greater understanding."
The teachers suggest that the project could be duplicated for
other areas of social history. Longer living experiences could
be provided, or even no living experiences if supplementary classroom
experiences were offered.