During an artifact bag lesson, students should be "actively engaged in reading, writing and researching to find answers to questions generated by an authentic historical artifact and their resulting curiosity.” Students will work in groups as a method of indirect instruction, encouraging students to talk and work cooperatively. Before the lesson begins, students will be asked to make a prediction hypothesis, one of the research-teaching strategies by simply using the outside of the bag for clues (Fuhler, 2006). An example of this step would be "If the bag has a compass on it, then the mystery explorer must be Henry Hudson." As a teacher you will need to remind students of the inquiry process. Make this process as clear as possible so the lesson runs smoothly. The teacher should model a mock artifact bag and explain her thought process for each step out loud. Show students that for each item they should ask the questions: Who/What? When? Where? Why? and How? (the 5Ws). Model for students how to record their answers on a data organizer. Modeling is very important when teaching students, it clarifies any confusion before the lesson begins. Then it's time for the students to go, but this does not mean your job teaching is over. As a teacher you must walk around the classroom assisting groups that may be stuck. This is very important to make sure no students are not understanding or have trouble making connections between the artifacts. Make sure students are writing down the information they are unfolding. Once students have examined all artifacts, have them make another hypothesis. This hypothesis should have more information and evidence included then the previous one. After hypotheses are made hand out QR codes to have students scan and find out their mystery explorer. After this lesson you could have the students write a letter to another classroom explaining what they learned and different information about the artifacts they discovered.
In class this week we were each assigned to create our own artifact bag lesson based on a person from our unit plan topic. My unit plan topic is Early Travelers, so I immediately thought of doing Christopher Columbus. For this project we were required to use technology. Therefore, I created an Artifact Bag Presentation to teach students the basics when using an artifact bag. Deciding what artifacts I wanted to include in my bag was the most difficult process. I kept thinking of different objects and then I would think of an even better one to use. I decided to use a map, a globe, 3 ships and a pin. This lesson excites me to become a teacher and teach a lesson just like this one!
The Map
I chose to do a map because my theme is Early Travelers and every explorer needs a map. The trick was where is this a map of? The students would be required to examine the entire map, notice that some information is in a different language hinting towards the place. This is a map of Hispaniola. Hispaniola is the first European settlement in the Americas founded by Christopher Columbus on his voyages. I burned the edges of the map and a spot in the middle to make it look more authentic and realistic for the students.
The GlobeThe next artifact I chose was a foam globe. During the age of exploration no one knew the Earth was round, they thought it was flat and to travel West would lead to falling off the face of Earth. Christopher Columbus thought differently. He thought that by traveling West he would find a quicker trade rout to Asia. Although he was right that the Earth was round and not flat, he soon realized there was more land than just the European, African and Asian continents. This globe has an arrow from Spain to the Caribbean, because that is where Columbus departed and landed on his voyages.
The Three Ships
I chose to do three ship artifacts because Christopher Columbus traveled on three ships. His three ships were the Niña, the Pinta and the Santa María. Students know this fact about Columbus so I though having the three ships would be a helpful piece of information to decode their explorer.
The Pin
This pin has two flags, the Italian flag and the Spanish flag. This pin symbolizes Christopher Columbus' home country and the country that gave him the opportunity to fulfill his dream of sailing West. This pin is made out of card stock with a pin glued to the back. Students should be able to make the connection between the flags and realize that their explorer is Christopher Columbus. If students do not know the two flags shown they will be encouraged to look them up on a computer.
In addition to the artifacts I included two other sources of information for my students. The first source was a website. This website has information about many different early travelers and explorers. The website encourages students to search for the pieces of evidence they have to match up with the correct explorer. I decided to use a website about many different explorers rather than just one because I thought that would be more of a challenge. This reasoning also applies for the book I chose. This book is filled with information and stories about explorers, but not too difficult for students to read. Each chapter is designated to an explorer with tons of information about his journeys. This book is "Around the World in a Hundred Years: From Henry the Navigator to Magellan" by Jean Fritz.Sources
Creating Historians Part Two: The Grab Bag. (n.d.). Retrieved April 16, 2015, from http://community.lessonplanet.com/t/creating-historians-part-two-the-grab-bag/136
Farris, P. J., & Nelson, P. A. (2006). Building literacy skills across the curriculum: Forging connections with the past through artifacts. In C. J. Fuhler (Author), The Reading Teacher (Vol. 59, Ser. 7, pp. 646-659).
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