College of Education
BEFORE YOUR VISIT
To assure an effective trip you will want to prepare your students before you visit the Oak Grove One-Room Schoolhouse. Our first suggestion is that you examine the Authentic Documents and Other Websites that are linked on the Georgia Southern University, College of Education's One-Room School Web page. There is information specifically about the Oak Grove School and background information in general about one-room schoolhouses. You will even find some generic lesson plans in the EdSiteMent link that provide an overview of one-room schoolhouse buildings, curriculum, transportation, recess and lunchtime. Under the Country School Association there are numerous books and links with an abundance of historical information.
Other pre-visit suggestions include:
(1) Briefly research historical people and events of the time periods that one-room schoolhouses were in use (late 19th century to mid-20th century). After the visit, refer back to this research and include the relevance.
a) One example of local interest - under Authentic Documents you will find a 1916 report from the rural school agent to the state superintendent of schools recommending local support for schools rather than dependency on state funds.
b) Presidents
c) Conflicts that involved the United States
d) Domestic economic issues
(2) In preparation for a comparison of available resources, make a list of supplies, equipment and resources that you use on a regular basis at your school. Things that you might include: paper, pencils, markers, crayons, scissors, glue, math manipulatives, white erase boards, individual textbooks, reproducible worksheets, computers, televisions, tape players, overhead projectors, nurse, counselors, lunchroom – food and staff, music/art/physical education teachers, intercom system, bathrooms, water fountains, air conditioning, etc.
(3) Also in preparation for a comparison, draw a “map” of your school building.
(4) Research Moonlight schools. A reference to them can be found in the 1916 report mentioned in 1) a.
(5) Find descriptions of the type of clothing that the teacher and the children would have worn in the early 1900's? Photographs are available by clicking here.
(6) Play some of the games that children at the One-Room Schoolhouse would have played at recess.
a. Baseball with pieces of wood for a bat and balls made out of string
b. Kick the Wickey – played with a foot long stick; one person kicks the stick and whoever catches it wins
c. Marbles – make a circle of string; put all the marbles inside the circle except for one per person; try to hit the marbles out of the circle; person who gets the most marbles wins
d. Kick the Can – much like hide and seek; can is placed at “home base”; one person designated as “It” and another is the “Can Kicker”; Can Kicker starts to kick the can away from home base and the person who is It has to chase after him to recapture the can; meanwhile, everyone else is hiding; once It has the can back at home base, he searches for others; if a player can get back to home base without being caught and start kicking the can, It has to retrieve the can and start all over again; last player to be caught is It for the next game.
e. Fetch the Bacon – one person is designated Leader (usually the teacher)/ everyone else separates into two teams about 20 feet apart; players on each team are numbered; an object (perhaps an eraser) is placed in the center of the field; the leader calls out a number and the two players with that number race to capture the object; the team who captures the object the most times wins the game
(7) Make a Quill Pen – instructions available at http://www.nhhistory.org/edu/support/nhgrowingup/quillpens.pdf
(8) Read books individually or as a class that refer to one-room schoolhouses (e.g. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Anne of Green Gables, Little House on the Prairie series, especially Farmer Boy ). Ask the children to compare and contrast the school experiences described in the books and their own school experiences. For example: in Farmer Boy – would our reasons for missing a day of school be similar to the Wilders' excuse? This could be done orally as a class discussion or as a written assignment.