Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Wendy Driscoll’s History in the Baking project rethinks Confederation
11 Plays15 days ago
In Wendy Driscoll’s History in the Baking project, her middle school class wonders how the conversation about Canadian Confederation may have differed with other voices.
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction of the 2023 Governor-General's History Award
00:00:03
Speaker
Welcome to another episode of the Teaching Canada's History podcast. I'm your host, Brooke Campbell, and today we are speaking with the finalists for the 2023 Governor-General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching.
00:00:14
Speaker
Created in 1996, the award recognizes best practices in teaching Canadian history and is an opportunity to highlight the important work that teachers and students are doing to interpret and share the stories of the past.
00:00:26
Speaker
For more information about the Governor-General's History Awards, visit canadashistory.ca slash awards.
Wendy Driscoll's 'History in the Baking' Project
00:00:32
Speaker
Today I'm speaking with Wendy Driscoll, a junior high teacher in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. Thanks for joining me today, Wendy.
00:00:38
Speaker
Hi, thanks for having me. Well, let's just jump right on in. Can you share an overview of your History in the Baking project and explain the key steps that your students took in their work?
00:00:50
Speaker
Sure. So um History in the Baking is um a project that I work do with my grade seven students. It's a reader's theater and reflection.
00:01:00
Speaker
So the question that we're trying to work through is why it is important or why is it important to consider multiple points of view on a big question? And we use confederation as our big question. And we use this play as a reader's theater to look at what some of the perspectives might have been in the voices that were not heard in Confederation.
Exploring Diverse Historical Perspectives
00:01:23
Speaker
So um I'm in Nova Scotia, so we um have a maritime focus in our grade seven social studies curriculum. So we usually start with a conversation just about how we make decisions. And we talk about
00:01:41
Speaker
what's it like to work with a group and what are the advantages and disadvantages of making decisions as a group? And then what is it like to make a decision by ourselves and what are the advantages and disadvantages of making decisions by ourselves? And we start with um that conversation and a map of British North America and We kind of home in on the Maritimes and start talking about what were some of the decisions that the Maritimes might have been making. And that kind of leads us into the Charlottetown Conference. So the students have background background. from previous lessons in responsible government, colonial government, but we're really kind of getting into this question of of union. of union
00:02:23
Speaker
And so then we introduced the idea of the Charlottetown Conference, and we do that through this play that I wrote.
Inquiry-Based Learning and Perspective-Taking
00:02:30
Speaker
Originally, I wrote the play thinking that it could be kind of um more of a theater piece, maybe something that a high school class might perform for a junior high class.
00:02:41
Speaker
And as our curriculum changed here in Nova Scotia and we started to ah look at more inquiry-based learning and we started to look at perspective taking as an undercurrent of of theme in our in our social studies courses, I took this play and I thought, what can I do to make this a tool for learning as opposed to just a performance piece um as I had originally imagined it? And so um so the students read it with me and we um we we read it like a reader's theater. So We take some different times, taking different turns, at various points of the script. We might pause and discuss, look at pictures from the time period.
00:03:31
Speaker
And as each new character is introduced, we start thinking about who is this person and what would their perspective be? So the characters in the play are fictional for the most part. And, um, it's the, it's a conversation of people who actually were never really consulted in, in, in the Confederation conversation.
Creative Reflections on Historical Events
00:03:54
Speaker
So it, um, it takes place at the Charlottetown conference in the kitchen, they're getting ready for the reception where all the fathers of Confederation are going to be, but the different people who are participating in, this preparation are people like a Mi'kmaq couple, a Black Islander, woman. We've got a tenant farmer. So we've got folks that really voices were, you know, nobody ever asked what they thought of Confederation. And so this gives the students hopefully just an idea that it's important to think about other points of view. And then we do a reflection exercise after we read the play where the students have an opportunity to choose way to show their understanding in kind of a reflective way. So they could introduce a new character that, you know, could be somebody, and it doesn't have to be somebody who's historically lived in Charlottetown in the 1860s. It could be an immigrant. It could be you know, someone who has background like them. It could be someone who speaks a totally different language. And so could be someone who's disabled, somebody who is queer. It could be, you know, it's up to them to kind of introduce a new character They could write a whole scene, new scene. They could design program as if the play was being staged and write a synopsis that sort of shows their understanding of the story.
00:05:33
Speaker
um They could have a character in the play break the fourth wall and kind of address the audience and how would they talk about their point of view. Or they could they could even take one of the famous Confederation portraits, such as the one from Charlottetown or the one from Quebec City and they could swap people out. So who else would you put in that picture if they had been included in the conversation? So it's ah it's just a way to kind of go back to that, like I said, that question, why is it important to consider multiple points of view on a big decision? And they have an opportunity to look at one another's arch or scene that they might have written as part of their reflection activity and and sort of see what other people thought of
The Value of Diverse Historical Voices
00:06:13
Speaker
the story. And this sets us up for further lessons as we go ahead in our in our social studies curriculum, but it's kind of a neat way to address some of those unheard voices and kind of hopefully give students in my class an opportunity to to see other people in the conversation, maybe a little bit more reflective of who they are as well.
00:06:38
Speaker
Yeah, there's so many different elements to this project. i You've talked a lot about the importance of the historical perspective taking in this work. um Can you speak more to how this is woven in the project as well as other elements of historical thinking that your students were able to deepen and strengthen?
00:06:58
Speaker
Sure. Well, um one of the things that the students are really surprised at and, and um you know, i've I've described this before is You know, we're in Nova Scotia, but they're very familiar. They've been to Prince Edward Island, many of them. They understand where Charlottetown is, and it's called the birthplace of Confederation. And so when they find out that Charlottetown did not actually join Confederation when the others did in 1867, they're a little bit surprised. And so then they we talk about, you know, um the the historical thinking element of of historical significance. So why is this conference so significant um to to other people and places when it wasn't even part of Charlottetown or Prince Edward Island's decision at the time? So it's kind of a neat, you know, they're they're kind of surprised to find that out that that, you know, and what is historical significance? The other thing that's really funny is that, you know,
00:07:55
Speaker
and and you know lots of people don't know this, but there was a circus in town in Charlottetown at the exact same time in August, of in September of 1864. And ah people in Charlottetown were way, way, way more excited about the circus. And so if you were you know transported back in time and you talk to anybody on the street, that was the thing they would have been talking about. So in terms of significance of this conference, or a lot of people wouldn't have even known it was going on. so why is it significant now?
00:08:27
Speaker
And we've lost the story of the circus. And why was the circus the thing that brought everybody into town and took up all the hotel rooms and not the Charlottetown conference, which now is, you know, consider this sort of birth um piece of consider of confederation. So I think that that's ah an important and historical thinking element. I think historical perspective, just just for the students to understand when when when I did the research to write the play, the challenge I had was that these voices are not recorded. So where do you find that accurate historical information? So for the kids to um for the kids to kind of understand that or or even sort of look at why were some voices valued? It's hard for them in grade seven sometimes not to look at history and wag their finger and and say, oh, you should have listened to these people. You should have done that. But I think that um there is a conversation to be had about why some voices were valued at the time or not valued at the time. And then, um and and why would we sort of look back retrospectively and value those more now?
00:09:39
Speaker
And I think the other thing that comes into play is continuity and change and just that whole idea back to this historical significance, how can we tell that this was a turning point? Why do we now consider it a turning point? Was it a turning point for everybody? um And then if we look at the people whose stories were left out, um what was the um was it a turning point for them and what stayed the same or what changed for those people? So I think that those are the ones that um really filter through this project. um and And it's, you know, we may not name them as sophisticatedly as that in grade seven, but we certainly talk about that idea about voices and value and, um you know, why something's important or why something might be a pivotal moment. So it's certainly something that is easy to have a conversation to about with with grade seven.
Personal Impact of Diverse Perspectives
00:10:37
Speaker
When you reflect back on the project as a whole, what impact do you think it's had on your students' learning and what might be some of the outcomes that you've seen?
00:10:48
Speaker
So I think for for my students, I think that, um you know, certainly curriculum has changed a lot in recent years. And and it's it's a lot different than when I first started teaching where you had sort of black and white textbooks with you know, words and charts. And and um i'm happy I'm so happy that we have more varied resources that kind of show different perspectives.
00:11:15
Speaker
But it's still true that not everybody sees themselves in the curriculum. And so I think and i I hope that my students through this particular activity and through the other similar kinds of activities that we do in our school had an opportunity to kind of, in a small way, see themselves reflected um in the story. And if they um weren't personally there, that they realized that they're not the only people who weren't, you know, personally there. And to sort of say,
00:11:51
Speaker
um what would the, how how would things have changed if we included different people? How would, you know if my perspective had been included, what would what would that have sounded like? And so ah one of the things that um I find really powerful is when students choose um the portrait option or the create a new scene option, and they include somebody in their life that they think is important. So i had, for example, an African Nova Scotian student who did the portrait. and included um an African Nova Scotian community leader that she knew. And so as a personal person, it wasn't just, she didn't just sort of sketch an African Nova Scotian person into the portrait. She goes, no, this is so-and-so because she would have been really you know important. She would have said her opinion. And so I think that in terms of impact,
00:12:50
Speaker
if each student has a little moment like that where they can say, here's a piece of it that I can connect to or that I think is important to me as a, you know, as a student or me as a member of a community, um i think that that's the piece that I see as really an important outcome that, you know, there's the academic outcomes, but there's also the how do we relate this and how do we find that this is an important, where do I fit in as ah as a 12 year old sort of thing? So um i think that that's probably the the most satisfying part is when they sort of get personal with their reflection and are able to connect it with somebody or or something that they know in their own community.
00:13:36
Speaker
Thank you so much, Wendy, for sharing more about your work with me and with our listeners. Well, thank very much for having me.