LAKEPORT — Terrace Middle School fourth-graders, teachers and parents were transported back to the 19th century on Tuesday during the inaugural “49er Day.”
“It”s really a great way to teach,” Curtis Reichert, fourth-grade teacher and the event”s creator, said.
Roughly 90 students participated in more than a dozen activities that would have been part of everyday life amid California”s Gold Rush in 1849.
With the help of school staff and parent volunteers, the children completed tasks such as doing laundry on a washboard, searching for gold, churning butter and spending mock money.
The fourth-graders also frequented a variety of 1800s establishments, including the bank, saloon, general store, boarding house and sheriff”s office — most of which were set up under tents on the school”s upper campus.
While learning more about California history, students applied their math, science and vocabulary skills in hands-on situations.
“The kids want to do this every Tuesday from now on,” Reichert joked.
He said the event was created in part as an alternative to a field trip to Northern California gold country.
“I think doing it in the county and having people involved in the county is nice,” parent and volunteer Nicole Winegarner said. “It”s a fun day.”
Assistant principal Pat Rubey praised the work of school staff and volunteers, and called the event “a super-creative way to bring the field trip here.” He added, “And if they continue to build on it, it”s only going to get bigger.”
