Civil War Washington Teaching Fellowship--Reboot

In the last post, I talked about the Civil War Washington Teaching Fellowship. This mini-post is a set of links to previous posts about my week with them last summer. There are easily the same number of posts I don't offer links to so, if you are up for some exploring....

Walking in the steps of grieving father at Oak Hill Cemetery

When memories aren't allowed, let the house speak for you

Prepare. Experience. Reflect.

How long do you let kids marinate in an uncomfortable discussion?

Furnished with ideas, not objects

Sleeping in the president's deathbed

Wichita Connection #2

At Ford's Theater

I was asked by the kids which spot had the most meaning and I'll close with a link to that post. My attraction to these types of  location are all over this blog, like here, here and here. I don't think of them the way otehrs do, I see them as flashpoints for rememberance, reflection and vision for the future. History is a way of looking at the past in order to chart a course toward the future--these places encapsulate that idea.

How Sleep the Brave

"On this site in 1897 nothing happened." and other CCWTF thoughts.

I'm am preparing for a webinar with the new Civil War Washington Teaching Fellows today and it has me waxing nostalgic. I thought I would offer a top ten five six list to them for their edification.

5. Wear comfortable shoes...

All the coordinators from the different sites are all apparently seasoned Olympic calibre marathon runners and are unaware that some of us are less agile. ;)Walking tours and house tours and the Bataan march that is the steps up to Douglass' house. These tour are going to  give you boat loads of pictures and notes and you will use so much of it in your classrooms, but really...where is the Segway flatland tour/pubcrawl?

 

 

 

 

 

4. Take notes...

 

I know, you are officially on summer vacation ... but as you walk the city of Georgetown or listen to the tour guide at the US Capitol (the best tour I've ever had of the site, BTW), or listen to a speech at the Douglass house, or are in a class session...something is going to be said that you'll want to remember back home. I use my notes from CWWTF quite a bit this year. The depth and insights you're going to walk away are invaluable. Make sure you have a place to capture them.

 



 

3. Give yourself time to process...

I referred to my time in DC as the equivalent of drinking from a fire hose. I'm blessed that I can say that of a number of the seminars, classes, fellowships I've attended. The CWWTF fire truck was on full blast all week and I needed time to process. I have found keeping a blog is a great way for me to process and often find myself going back to old posts and finding new ideas that just needed fleshing out. If not a blog, get a journal or something that you can use.

 

 

2. Pray to the roommate gods....

 

You are going to meet some of the coolest teachers and you'll become fast friends. CWWTF is in some ways a master class. Listen to them and learn from them. Perhaps the most important person is going to be your room mate. Now Jake at Ford's is a nice guy but, from my experience, is terrible at matching roommates. Depending on your faith tradition, light candles, fire up a smudgepot, paint a red circle in the middle of the room, whatever you need to do. The only negative part of my experience was my room mate--how did that guys even get selected! He came to classes unprepared, never once asked a question or offered an insight and I would talk about his hygiene but he was from Oklahoma so I really didn't have high hopes for that anyway. (After all this, James, I suppose that when we meet up this summer I'm buying lunch?!)

 



 

1. Think about how you take the experience back to your kids...

 

If you are like me, you spend a lot of your summer reworking your curriculum for the next school year. I wish I could explain to non-teachers how much prep really goes into good teaching. As you are processing and collaborating with the other fellows, keep a running list of things you want to bring back. I found that, a week or two after I'm back, when the 'tyranny of the urgent' returns, I forget. That may be just me. A great trick suggested a few years ago was to create a running list while you're there of ideas to play with or content to add. If I'm not intentional, then I remember it a day before I need it and, well, that means it ain't gonna happen.

 

And finally... Bring a friend...

 

There is absolutely no reason for this thought other than these Flat Stanley pictures were burning a hole in my pocket. (shhh, some of them aren't even from CWWTF)

 

 

 

 

 



"Agitate, Agitate, Agitate!"

 

Painting of  Frederick Douglas which hangs at Cedar Hill (Source: NPS)

 

Today, we talked about Frederick Douglass. The kids will tell you I loves me my Frederick Douglass! He is, for me, an epitome of an what I think of as quintessentially American. I love Madison for his ability to craft a government and Lincoln for his ability to steer that government  to reunion, but I love Douglass for his fearless reminder of the great good and great harm government can do for and to its people.

I had the chance to spend a couple days at Cedar Hill, his Victorian home just north of DC this summer and took a video of an actor re-enacting a portion of one of Douglass' speech. The actor, Kevin McIlvaine, has a YouTube site with better quality versions of his work here. I asked for his permission to post this last summer and he graciously said yes. The video above was supposed to be a portion of the Douglass' What to a Slave is the Fourth of July, unfortunately technology is not playing nicely in my sandbox so, for now, here is a video of Mr. McIlvaine's recitation of Martin Luther King's Letter from a Birmingham Jail.

Below are two sites, one for Cedar Hill and one a transcript of the excerpted speech you'll eventually hear on the video. Imagine hearing this speech in 1852 by a former slave on the day after our nation's 76th anniversary.

Frederick Douglass National Historic Site

What to a Slave is the Fourth of July

BTW-If you don't know the reference to the title, google it! For me, that story is the essence of Frederick Douglas.

Cane given to Frederick Douglass by Mary Todd Lincoln. It was one of the president's. (Source: NPS)