|
National Handwriting Day is January 23, 2024 When we study our schoolhouse documents of the past we are in awe of the beautiful and flowing scripts exhibited in their handwriting and wish we could duplicate those efforts. Do you bemoan the loss of penmanship skills? Have your local schools abandoned the practice of cursive writing? National Handwriting Day was established to raise awareness of the many benefits of handwriting, a.k.a. cursive writing and may even succeed in returning this skill to the classroom. The many upsides of handwriting have been published in countless articles and books, but one infographic can state the case very clearly and visually. Pens.com has invited their patrons to share this infographic with readers who might be interested in those bullet points. Sounds reasonable to me! Note: This infographic is longer than usual, but keep scrolling down. 
0 Comments
 Recognize Your Country School with a Marker The good news is that the CSAA Schoolhouse Registry continues to add honorees to our roll! Schoolhouses in 22 states are currently represented by our beautiful registry markers with more applying. The recognition is not only from our organization, but the groups who have restored or preserved their schoolhouses display their markers to the delight of their visitors and community. The marker speaks loudly that a preserved schoolhouse has contributed in some positive way to the appreciation and understanding of the country school experience and its unique architectural and historical heritage. Anyone who is actively involved with a schoolhouse or visits one knows of the vital role played by country schools in the establishment of our public school system and the desire of the community to produce literate. moral, and patriotic American citizens. This is a history we dare not lose. It is a history we must promote more than ever in times of rapid change in education. Please consider applying for your marker (if you don't already have one) and join us in recognizing the contribution of our forefathers for building 220,000+ one-room schools and our preservationists for saving and sharing a schoolhouse. REQUEST: CSAA would like to add to our gallery of photos of CSAA Schoolhouse Registry Schools and their sponsors on our website. If you would share a photo of your schoolhouse or marker and where you located it, that would be nice too. We look forward to seeing you! Please send those along to Susan Fineman at [email protected] with identification. THANKS!!! Ideas Galore for Schoolhouse Reenactment! Does your country schoolhouse welcome school field trips? Do you have a curriculum you would care to share with groups seeking ideas? Nationwide, programs are alive and well offering the experience of teaching in and attending our restored one-room schools. Dedicated volunteers don period clothing to stage re-enactments and living history classes for our young visitors and enthusiastic adult groups as well. Schoolmarms and schoolmasters share their knowledge of country schooling in the most endearing settings, our schoolhouses, meticulously restored with furniture, artifacts, and a curriculum crafted by those same volunteers. Does this describe you? Welcome is the news that there are still groups restoring a schoolhouse whose goal is to serve local school children and help them step back into history. But, they ask...Where two we start? This question was posed to us recently by the Merrimack Historical Society in Merrimack, NH. They already own a beautiful one-room schoolhouse, but they are planning a new direction by offering regular living history classes. They are seeking ideas. We will offer here for Merrimack, other seekers, and for our readers, a perfect guide for programming. Here are scores of ideas for your schoolhouse created by CSAA member, Susan Webb. It is a narrated video slide show she submitted for our 2021 CSAA Virtual Conference line-up and it is filled with resources. CSAA's Susan Webb, "The Traveling Schoolmarm," was a master at such hands-on activities and she shared her passion for reenactment at many of our annual conferences and to historic groups across the country. Sadly, Susan passed away in October 2023, but we honor her memory, knowledge, and creativity once more by sharing Using the Ten R's (of Reenactment) as she would have wished. Note: If you have a written curriculum you'd like to share with others, send it along to Susan Fineman (with our gratitude) and we will make it available to individuals seeking ideas. [email protected] We will post your contribution on the CSAA Resources Page.  CSAA Member Re-Launches Award Winning Series
with New Illustrations by Pattie HartNaus I’m proud to announce the relaunch in 2024 of the multi-award winning Belden Boy, an anti-bullying series for children that was tied to the discovery of a deserted one-room schoolhouse in the driftless area many years ago. Why a relaunch? Well, let me begin by saying that this was a passion journey for me, beginning with the reading of the Laura Ingalls Wilder stories from my childhood. The books were given to me in the 1960s as a gift by my grandma, stories that made me long for living in a log cabin in the woods and going to a one-room school in the 1800s. My love for all things that resembled a rustic and simpler life helped to shape the person I would become. When I was completing my Masters Class in Education in 2003, I was asked ironically to help save the old 1859 Belden School as my last assignment. I couldn’t have dreamed of a more perfect project than to restore a one-room school. I was given two old journals of Belden from 1871 and 1923, that were retrieved from the garbage by a local farmer. I was also given the names of a few elderly students who happened to be part of the class that closed the school in 1943 to consolidation. I spoke with these folks who happened to have stories of going to school in the day; stories that could make you smile, laugh, and even bring a tear to your eye. I recorded those stories and made the Belden students a promise that I would save and record everything that I scribed. I did just that. This was the beginning of a journey in writing the Belden Boy Series. I came to know my characters as if they were friends: “Peter McDugal is a boy who is shy, quiet and does what he knows is right. His pal, Franky, is very much the opposite. He comes from a family who is down and out, only child to a sick mother and a failed famer who just doesn’t care. Franky runs through the woods each day, doing what he pleases, and goes to school only if he feels like it. He bullies anyone and everyone, especially his pal Peter. Miss Bishop is a kind and caring teacher who tries her best to talk to the boys about their friendship. But as time moves on, so does she. A new schoolmaster comes to the community. He butts heads with Franky as he is a bully, as well. Then comes Annie. A young girl who travels down from Minnesota with her Pa to the Belden community to live with her Grandpa who is ‘soft in the head’, as they say. She and her pa help the old man until his dying day, but during those days, Franky comes to call. It’s true that Annie suffers from a disability, but that doesn’t keep her down. Her character is strong and intends to do what she can to help the boys. Annie introduces Grandpa to Franky, who intrigues the boy, and teaches him a thing or two about life during the ‘War Between the States’, serving alongside Ulysses S. Grant. Franky and Peter are in awe of the old man and his stories, and smitten with their new friend Annie.” Each of the four books in the Belden Boy series is told in first person from a different character: victim Peter McDugal in the first two books, Franky, the bully, in the third book, and the girl bystander, Annie, in the fourth book. Series is tied to Common Core State Standards for perspective and figurative language. So, it’s time to relaunch my old friends in the series Belden Boy, giving them new life with a new look. For me, the stories are a celebration of all the things I loved as a child especially, one-room schools. Let the relaunch begin January 2024! ~P. J. HarteNaus Whistleslick Press LLC www.whistleslickpress.com NOTE: Pattie HartNaus has been a regular contributor at our annual CSA Country School Conferences and has presented a number of topics including the restoration of the Belden School featured in her series. She has also offered a program on how to hold a successful Summer Writing Camp for children in your country school. . Pattie has received two Scholarship and Artistry Awards from CSAA for her fine work covering social issues, but set in a one-room country school. The same issues will resonate today with our young readers. Access her website below for more information! |
