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Barbara Kay of St. Louis, Mo., takes notes on Sunken Road in Fredericksburg during a Teacher Institute session.
Teachers Martha Ehrlich, Melody Burger and Lauren Bommarito examine bullet holes in the Innis House.
Teacher Institute participants listen as the Park Service's Ryan Longfellow discusses the Battle of Fredericksburg. |
THE TEACHERS were doing what they instruct students to do: getting a feel for history by walking the path of those who made it.
That's what brought 160 teachers from across the country who specialize in history, social studies and related disciplines to Fredericksburg-area battlefields yesterday to take part in the 2009 Teacher Institute sponsored by the Civil War Preservation Trust.
The approach: Immerse teachers in the Civil War in a way that will better help them pass it on to students.
Jamie Massey of Claremore, Okla., came to understand the carnage inflicted on Union soldiers trying in vain to get to the stone wall at the foot of Marye's Heights, which gave Confederate units perfect cover in the 1862 Battle of Fredericksburg.
Jackie Fleming of Rutland, Vt., eyeballed the actual bullet holes in the Innis House just below that stone wall, and got a kick out of discovering that city resident Martha Stevens, who owned the house, left the damaged siding in place after the war to earn an occasional dollar with the dwelling as a sort of tourist attraction.
Taking a walk along Sunken Road, and hearing about the damage done in battles here, Beth Cogswell of Fairfax came to understand some of the far-reaching damage the war did hereabouts.
National Park Service guide Randy Washburn, a former Stafford County school principal, told the teachers that the population of Spotsylvania County didn't make it back up to pre-Civil War totals until the late 20th century.
He told them that half of the people who fled from Fredericksburg during the war never returned; that 84 buildings were destroyed; and that income in the city plummeted some 70 percent.
And that in Stafford, where large numbers of troops bivouacked between battles, soldiers cut so many trees for firewood in some spots that that "you couldn't find one for miles."
That sort of information and workshops on a range
The eighth-grade social-studies teacher said she faces a special challenge. Her state sent many young men to fight in the war, but those battlefields are far away.
"I can't take my students to the battlefields, but I can come here and collect artifacts and information to make it all more real for them," said Fleming.
She and other teachers I talked to said the key thing they'll take home is the sort of information and personal tidbits that can make history seem real and immediate.
"Thirteen-year-olds already feel like they're the center of the universe, so you have to find a way they can connect with or relate to about what you're teaching," she said.
Connie Sullivan, who teaches sixth grade at Dixon-Smith Middle School in Stafford, was one of several local teachers taking part in the institute.
"Yes, even though I've been here before and call this area home, I've learned a great deal I didn't know before," said Sullivan, who deserved the good sport award for taking in Sunken Road and more on crutches after knee surgery.
LaVerne McDonald of Birmingham, Ala., said she'll be a student for most of the session, but also a presenter for part of it.
The director of a history project in Birmingham schools is scheduled to share what she has learned about the connection between the Confederacy and the English city of Liverpool.
"Many people don't realize it, but the Confederacy had strong ties to the city, mainly because of the slave trade that ran through there," said McDonald, who studied one summer at a university there.
She added: "The Confederacy even had an embassy there. Businessmen there during the Civil War had a keen interest in the South winning the war."
Rob Hedelt: 540/374-5415
Email: rhedelt@freelancestar.com
