History Comes Alive
One of the main reasons educators take students on field trips is to get them excited about their subject matter, and it often works. Studying or reading about a civilization that has been gone for centuries tends to be a bit boring for most youngsters, but showing them how people really lived in the past can give them a reason to study harder. There are many museums where history comes alive as professional actors recreate the daily living experiences of those who lived and died centuries ago.
Reading about a way of life is much different from watching someone do it, and this is the goal of some field trips. Students may read about how furniture was made by hand, but a craftsman using tools that have never needed power and showing pride in the work can change how they view the subject. Modern methods of furniture create contain many shortcuts, but those were not always available. Showing students the difference can have a profound effect on how they perceive history.
Electronics are currently prevalent in many of today’s societies, but there was a time when social media platforms did not exist. Showing students how information was shared among members of a small community can open their eyes to a different lifestyle. Gossip was the main way people traded information, and showing students how people observed their fellow settlers gives them a new outlook on ancestral innovations. The ability of their ancestors to discover and disseminate information is vastly different, but it still got the job done.
There are many fascinating aspects of history students may miss if they only read about them, so showing them in a live setting can be educational while still being fun. Rather than feeding them information in the form of facts, demonstrating a different lifestyle will give them a way to remember the facts because they have seen the reality of historical life.