My students need to visit Plimoth Plantation, where they will travel back in time to completely understand what life was like for the Wampanoag and the Pilgrims 400 years in this place we now call Massachusetts.
This project is part of the Black History Month celebration because it supports a Black teacher or a school where the majority of the students are Black.
My Students
Our 4th graders are some of the most creative, intelligent, and curious young people you could hope to meet. They love learning about history, reading about people who have engaged in remarkable endeavors, creating projects to show their solutions to math problems, and playing games in the classroom and outside. Most speak a language other than English at home and represent many different countries, including Cape Verde, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Somalia, Nigeria, and Haiti. A handful know that they have Native American heritage and even know what tribe.
Our 4th graders bring much excitement and wonder to school, and they need inspiration to keep that enthusiasm going.
At home, many of them have parents who work two to three jobs and are unable to take their kids to museums, exhibits, and other historical and cultural places of interest. Consequently, many of our students do not have the life experiences that build the rich language resources that are needed to have strong literacy skills. The majority of our students are reading at least one grade level below where they should be. School plays an important role in providing them with the experiences they need to build knowledge.
My Project
At Plimoth Plantation, we will be traveling 400 years back in time when the Pilgrims from England first set foot on the land we now call the United States. They met the Wampanoag, the indigenous people who had been living here for thousands of years before. For a few decades, the Pilgrims and Wampanoag lived peacefully with one another, learning from one another, and trading. Plimoth Plantation has the Pilgrim settlement, where actors dress, talk, work, and act like the Pilgrims of the early 1600's. We will have the chance to meet them, sit in their homes, watch them build their houses, and do other work like blacksmithing. We will ask them questions about their lives, why they traveled so far away from their homes, and what their relations are like with the Wampanoag.
Nearby the Pilgrim settlement is the Wampanoag village.
The Wampanoag people who work there are traditionally dressed as their ancestors did, but they emphasize to visitors that Wampanoag people still live in Massachusetts today. They live and dress like we do, but they are very proud of their history and cultural heritage. We will explore their wetus (houses), watch how they make canoes out of trees, cook over fires, and make tools and weapons. The experiences with both the Wampanoag and the Pilgrims will bring the history we have been studying in books to life. Our 4th graders will leave Plimoth with lasting images in their minds and a context for future learning about their own history.
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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Ms. Pastor and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
