NC Museum of History

I've lived in the Raleigh area my whole life, so I have enjoyed revisiting museums I haven't been to since I was in school. The expansion project at the NC Art Museum was impressive. The featured exhibits and artwork changed my opinion about art integration in the classroom. I was hoping my visit to the NC Museum of History would have a similar impact on me. Honestly, I can't even remember past experiences to the museum. The building hasn't changed much, if at all, and the replica of the Wright Brothers' plane is still hanging in one area of the museum, exactly as I remember it. The rest of my memories from the NC Museum of History have gone into long-term storage (it's tough to retrieve those)!

I had high expectations regarding our class visit to the NC Museum of History in downtown Raleigh. History is one of my favorite subjects, but I've never been a very strong history student. I'm not good at rote memorization or reciting dates and key events in chronological order, which is what a lot of teachers think history is all about. Chronology is important, but students have to know the events that make up certain wars or eras before they can put them in order. The Museum of History does a great job of teaching students about different time periods throughout the museum. One of my favorite parts was the 1920s drugstore, which was actually located on Fayetteville Street. There's a photograph of the original drugstore to give students an idea of what it may have looked like (since Fayetteville Street looks totally different today). The family that owned the drugstore gutted the building and gave many of the "insides" of the store to the museum. There's an old soda fountain, a cigar counter, a candy counter, and an area featuring medicines and other medicinal containers and bottles. This area of the museum fascinated me - it was like we had stepped inside the actual store. We were back in the 1920s looking at actual items that could have been bought back then. I think this would be a great way to integrate math and social studies in the classroom - students could consider the prices of items in the 1920s compared to the prices of the same items today. I'm sure the results would be quite surprising for elementary school students. Probably even for the teacher!

I also enjoyed the photography exhibit. As I learned last week at the NC Museum of Art, art can tell a very detailed story about a particular places' culture and the people that live there. The exhibit featured farm life in North Carolina and all of the photographs on display were from the Great Depression era. Again, students would get a great understanding of life during the Great Depression from the photographs displayed, but also from the various artifacts featured within this exhibit. Music and videos also portray life during this era as well. This was one of my favorite exhibits and really shows the power of photographs!

The Thomas Day exhibit intrigued me. I learned a great deal about who he was and I think he was an important figure in North Carolina, but I'm not sure how I could get a classroom full of students interested in an exhibit featuring a bunch of furniture. This is where I think the teacher has to do some homework, figuring out how to connect the NCSCOS standards to her students and to the actual artifacts in the exhibit. I want my students to get memories from their visits to museums, rather than just remembering the physical environment, like I did. Doing pre-museum activities to engage students in what they will be viewing and exploring at the museum is critical for an exhibit like this.

After thinking about my latest visit to the museum, here's where my expectations weren't met. First off, I wanted to see a larger exhibit featuring Native Americans from North Carolina. We have such a large Native American presence in this state, so I was disappointed to see that the two artifacts showcasing North Carolina's Native American history were in a hallway. I also wanted to see more of an exhibit showing the history of Raleigh and how it became the capital of the state. Again, Raleigh has a rich history, none of which is seen at the NC Museum of History which is right in the capital city. I'm hopeful with the addition of the exhibit, The Story of North Carolina: Forging Identity and Creating Community, more of that history will be explained in detail. I'm looking forward to visiting again because museums are like libraries - there's an abundance of information just waiting to be uncovered and explored!

And here's a little information for the teacher. The museum has a great website, which you can visit here. There are resources for lessons, pre-museum activities, and a tour checklist. For teachers that need professional development, the museum offers online teacher workshops. Other featured resources include History-in-a-Box kits, Tar Heel Junior Historian Association, virtual field trips, and NC History Resource Database.

History usually gets a bad wrap in the classroom. I'm sure if I asked many of you what your history experiences were like throughout school you'd either say you don't remember or they were boring/not fun. Teaching means the educator is taking responsibility for the content being taught - it's all about using powerful and effective resources in the classroom in order to reach each student. I'm looking forward to utilizing resources from the NC Museum of History's website in order to create a social studies environment in my elementary classroom in which students can't wait to learn!