Sonja McGinnis, a fourth grade teacher at Mechanicsville Elementary School, and 23 other educators from across Virginia will bring to their classrooms new knowledge and experience gained during the 2010 Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation Summer Teacher Institute, held July 11-16 at Jamestown Settlement and Yorktown Victory Center history museums. 

Correlated with the Virginia Standards of Learning, the institute emphasized interactive, inquiry-based methods of teaching American history. 

A major component of the program was the opportunity for participants to work in period costume alongside museum historical interpreters.

The institute included tours of the museums’ exhibition galleries and outdoor living-history areas – recreated Powhatan Indian village, 1607 ships and 1610-14 colonial fort and riverfront discovery area at Jamestown Settlement, and re-created Continental Army encampment and 1780s farm at the Yorktown Victory Center. 

Teachers also toured Historic Jamestowne, site of America’s first permanent English settlement administered by the National Park Service and Preservation Virginia, and Yorktown National Battlefield, site of the decisive military engagement of the American Revolution. 

Participants attended presentations on Powhatan Indian culture, the origins of the Jamestown colony, Africans in 17th century Virginia, indentured servitude and slavery, the chronology of the American Revolution, and the seasonal cycle of work on an 18th century farm.

They also took part in “A Sea Grammar” and “A School for the Soldier,” hands-on programs featuring 17th century seamanship and 18th century military life. 

Before spending three afternoons as costumed historical interpreters, the educators attended workshops on historical clothing and interpretation theory and methods. 

The institute concluded with presentations of lesson plans developed during the week. Each participant received a kit of reproduction artifacts to use in the classroom.

The teacher institute was provided at no cost to the participants or their school districts through grants from a private family foundation and The Ukrop Foundation. 

For more information, call 888-868-7593 toll-free or 757-253-4939 or visit www.historyisfun.org.