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Union students visit Little Red Schoolhouse
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Madison Wess (far left), Ashley Ray, and Kristen Shaw were happy to answer questions from their teacher Linda Watts during their time at the Little Red Schoolhouse.
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Olivia Jones (left) did the heavy lifting as she studied reading with her friend, Lainie Raybuck.
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When Dean Gessler got thirsty, he had to go to the water bucket and ladle himself a drink, giving him an idea of what life was like 150 years ago for a student his age at the Little Red Schoolhouse.
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The Poland Historical Society has found that the students of 150 years ago would climb the pole in the center of the Little Red Schoolhouse for fun. Many of the students in Linda Watts’ class tried, but it was Justice Gonzalez who made it the highest.
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Neighbors | Sarah Foor. Bella Kathleine (left) and Sophia Sanito enjoyed the old-fashioned stories they read together in their McGuffey readers.
By SARAH FOOR
For the second-graders at Union Elementary, a recent field trip took them two miles away from their regular classrooms, but 150 years back in time.
Every year, each second-grade classroom at Union spends a day in the Poland Historical Society’s Little Red Schoolhouse and experiences the life of students in 1858.
Teacher Linda Watts visited the one-room museum and schoolhouse on May 5 with her second-graders. There, the group lived according to 1850s standards by completing spelling tests on slates, fetching water from a bucket and playing recess games like stickball and hoop and stick.
Watts hoped the day was a multifaceted learning experience for her students.
“I think today brings to life a lot of subjects that we’ve been working on in social studies. The kids get to see and compare what school was like 150 years ago to how they learn now,” Watts explained. “I also think it’s important for the students to learn the rich heritage and history of learning here in Poland.”
Although the experience was much different than a day at Union Elementary, the second-graders were open to living their day like 1850s students.
“I don’t mind all the differences,” Kylie Duby shared. “I like that the classroom is taller here and we get to take our tests in chalk.”
“I like all the grass around the school – it would be awesome to play outside every day,” Lanie Raybuck added.
After a long day of pretending to be students from 150 years ago, the lines between present and past became blurred.
“I stayed in character all day and made era-appropriate announcements about things like horses for sale and barn dances,” explained Watts. “The kids are so into our activities today that one of my students asked, ‘Do we really need to go to the barn dance on Friday?’”