“Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn.” Benjamin Franklin
To say that I am a proponent of active engagement and the use of artifacts and primary sources to promote learning would clearly be an understatement.
In the lessons created for my courses, I saw just how powerful such lessons can be for stimulating inquiry and analysis, judging fact/opinion, extending knowledge by adding to our study the credibility of real everyday things and documents.
As a professor of education, I would occasionally borrow an elementary class to test a lesson’s effectiveness for a particular age group. Such classes were a real joy to teach.
When I was in Japan in the mid-‘80’s, I made it a point to collect everyday objects that were used by Japanese children…that I could use later in creating a lesson for intercultural understanding. My collection included: a toothbrush and a small tube of toothpaste, comb, pen and pencil, plastic action figure, small notebook, pack of tissues, newspaper, a baby’s book with thick cardboard pages, small bag of snacks, a cassette tape, a pack of gum and small bag of Skittles.
Back home, I was pleased to see that a local department store was using dark gray plastic bags with draw string closures…perfect for my lesson.
I numbered the bags one through eight, put one of the objects inside and drew the closure leaving the opening large enough for a student to put his hand through to the inside and feel the object.
With a borrowed class of third graders, I asked the students to number a paper 1-8 and then make their way around the perimeter of the room to reach inside each bag and identify the object in that bag by feel alone, writing their guesses by those numbers on their list.
Seemed like a good game as the students eagerly got to work.
When everyone was back at their desks, we compared answers…and everyone had the same answers…a surprise to the class.
Then, I passed the bags around to clusters of students. The ties were loosened and the objects were removed. Another surprise! Again, everyone was correct in their answers but the surprise…the objects were not what they had expected when they were identifying them by feel.
Time for some discussion. I asked, “Why were you surprised when you saw the objects?”
Everyone spoke at once. “We couldn’t read the writing but we have those things here.” “It felt like my things but it really wasn’t exactly like mine.”
I explained that I had collected the objects when I was in Japan recently.
Question #2: When you consider these objects from Japan, what might you say about Japanese children?
Again, everyone spoke at once, then calmed to hear what each other had to say: Japanese children need the same things we need and they like some of the same things we like.
As the lesson concluded, the students wrote about the experience on the back of their papers.
Some interest continued: “Where exactly is Japan?” “My uncle works for a Japan company here.” All perfect lead-ins for the teacher’s lesson on geography and economic interdependence. (Kentucky Academic Standards for Grade Three.)
The active engagement, analysis and critical thinking that was sparked by simple everyday artifacts from another country was designed to lead the students to a greater awareness of their own culture and broader understanding of cultures other than their own, cultures represented in our community.
Could such a lesson be developed with today’s greater influx of world cultures in Northern Kentucky? The availability of artifacts from international cuisines in local restaurants and from culture-specific markets might suggest a replication of this lesson.
The Academic Standards of the Kentucky Department of Education encourage inquiry-based learning and critical, creative thinking.
In my own experiences with such teaching and learning, similar approaches are not just enticing but prove to be irresistible to learners of any age.
In these lessons, students experience respect for their thinking and ideas, a most affirming and encouraging realization.
• • • • •
And a different question for today…
The accompanying photos are from my Japanese friend and me; actual items which correspond to those used in the mid-‘80’s lesson.
But what if some of the items used in lessons today are made via computer? Even before the COVID years, one of our friends was creating objects using his computer alone. Would such an item generated by computer have the same impact? Substitutions for the actual thing? Revealed as substitutions? Not an artifact of Japanese culture but an artifact of our computer culture.
The real primary source in this lesson was my personal statement of having purchased the items while I was in Japan. The veracity of the owner was the important primary source.
Truth itself must never be in short supply when providing lessons of any kind.
Judy Harris is well established in Northern Kentucky life, as a longtime elementary and university educator. A graduate of Thomas More, she began her career there in 1980 where she played a key role in teacher education and introduced students to national and international travel experiences. She has traveled and studied extensively abroad. She enjoys retirement yet stays in daily contact with university students.