5 Weeks, 13 Students: The Best Summer of My Life!

This picture shows all 13 students in front of the Meeting House at the Rebecca Nurse Homestead. This image is important to me because it shows me and all the friends I have made during these memorable 5 weeks. My new friends come from all across the globe, some from as far away as Andover, Massachusetts!

 

Sadness overwhelms me as I prepare to leave Andover. The five weeks have gone by all to fast, and I am worried I might never see my new friends ever again. At least I can walk away knowing that I have learned a lot. I have learned more here at Andover in only five weeks, than at my regular school which lasts for about ten months! The best part was that for once in my life, I actually loved school. It will be hard for me to leave the amazing people I have met and befriended, but I must leave Andover. Hopefully I can attend Phillips for high school.

            I have learned a lot at Summer Session.

Some of the things I have learned are:

~New Skills

• How to take Cornell Notes
• How to make good plot charts
• How to write an annotated bibliography

~New Ideas

• 20 innocent people were killed during the Salem Witch Trials
• Indian Boarding Schools were an attempt to assimilate Native Americans into white culture
• The Nacirema are a present day civilization that has been around since the late 18^th century

 

I have learned a lot this summer, and I will miss all of my friends and teachers. I know that someday I will look back upon these memories and hopefully remember everyone I met and everything I did.

Salem: One Last Field Trip

Today we went on our final field trip, a trip to Salem, Massachusetts. I thought we were going to see the Witch Museum, but as usual, I was wrong. Instead we went to the Narbonne House, the Friendship, Gallows Hill, and Mr. Carr’s house. My favorite non-giftshop part of the trip was the Friendship. I tried out one of the hammocks below the deck, and I actually found it to be very comfortable. Before we left the ship, everyone was awarded a Jr. Ranger badge. After shopping in a giftshop, we went to Mr. Carr’s house. He had found more than 10,000 artifacts in his backyard, and he has been digging there for three years now. The most amazing thing about the artifacts he found was that a lot of them were still intact. Mrs. Carr gave us cookies and Coca-Cola which we gobbled up quickly. I had a fun day today, but I can’t believe Summer Session is almost over! With the last field trip completed, I feel really sad. I might never see any of my classmates ever again, but I will always hold the memories we made close to my heart.

Rebecca Nurse Homestead: The Finish Line

           

         Yesterday we visited the Rebecca Nurse Homestead for the last time. There were five test pits scattered around the front of the house. We didn’t find much, only pieces of brick, one small piece of glass, a bullet of some sort, a couple pieces of red ware, porcelain with blue decorations, and hundreds of nails. I found something really special though, a gold wash cufflink. At first we thought it was a brass button, but Nate told us it was a gold wash cufflink. Our luck quickly ran out after we hit the gravel layer. We didn’t find anything at all! At least I had fun digging!

            Before we left, we toured the house and meetinghouse. We watched a very interesting slideshow in the meetinghouse. It gave a brief history of the building and what it was used for. There wasn’t much in the house, but I learned a lot about how people lived in the 1600’s. It was sad to leave the Homestead, but I will always remember what I had learned and apply it to everyday life.

An Unexpected Dig

         Today, we returned to the homestead for a tour of the property. I expected to get the tour of the house, but I was disappointed when told I would have to wait until Saturday. Despite all the rain, we ended up hiking all over the place. We marched down to see the cemetery, climbed up past the alfalfa, and braved the tick infested north midden. We had learned a lot about the Nurse and Putnam families. We went inside for lunch, but like usual, the food wasn’t very appetizing. I thought we were going to continue our tour in the house, but there was a change in plans. We got to dig! However, our unit was unsuccessful. All we found was tons of little pieces of brick, pieces of bone, and a pipe stem. Malina had said how no matter what unit she’s digging in, it becomes unsuccessful because she is cursed. It’s happened three times now, so this curse might actually exist. Hopefully I’ll get to dig somewhere else on Saturday!

Rebecca Nurse Homestead: Week II

We returned to the Homestead today, and I was eager to find artifacts better than the ones we dug up last Saturday. I could hardly wait to start digging! As it turned out, we were digging right next to the unit we were in last week. Our new unit was right next to the unit which had practically nothing. We ended up finding dozens of artifacts, mostly big pieces of ceramic, paper, a pencil, tons of glass bottles, glass fragments, pieces of shoes, even a huge frying pan which was missing a handle. This unit was a success! I can’t wait to see what we’ll uncover next week!

Peabody Museum @ Harvard

Today we went to the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. The museum is owned by Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Although I live in Massachusetts, I have never visited Harvard before. I kinda liked it, but I felt that this visit wasn’t as interactive as our other field trips. Another downside to the trip was all the walking we did. Honestly, this trip wasn’t the greatest, but at least I got to go to Harvard.

My Experience at the Rebecca Nurse Homestead Dig

            After all that homework and Cornell notes, it was finally time to start digging! We went to Danvers, Massachusetts, home of the Rebecca Nurse Homestead, the place we will be digging for the next couple of weeks. The Homestead is very old, so you wouldn’t be surprised to see all the artifacts we dug up.

            The group I was in had to dig in the western midden. Middens were convenient places for people to dump their trash. In our unit we found: A buckle, rubbery pieces of shoes, tiny ceramic pieces, small bird bones, a peanut (I’m not kidding!), rusty old nails, fragments of glass, and charcoal. We found a lot of charcoal, and we even found a giant chunk of it too. That piece of charcoal must have been 7 inches long and 3 inches wide!

Some of the features we found were: rocks, rocks, and more rocks, tons of worms, probably enough to go fishing with, lots of coal, and many roots. Malina named one of the worms Martin Luther King Jr. Jr. Jr. Jr., and I named one of them Wormy. Kenny seemed like he wanted to torture the worms, Christine was afraid of them, and Sameer ignored us and worked diligently as we slacked off. We found a lot in our unit, but we had to make a bigger effort to find it. But that doesn’t matter, because we had fun digging, and I can’t wait until next Saturday’s dig!

My Experience at the Mashantucket Pequot Museum

The Main Exhibit

The main exhibit was the coolest exhibit I’ve ever seen! The environment surrounding the village looked real, and the villagers looked very lifelike. Everything about the exhibit contributed to making it seem like I was really there. The sound of birds and animals filled the entire exhibit, and you could even see the birds and animals if you looked closely enough. My favorite part of the exhibit was the waterfall, because it was real. This exhibit was so cool that I would definitely think of going again with my parents because they never got to see it.

My Experience at the Mashantucket Pequot Museum

The Main Exhibit

The main exhibit was the coolest exhibit I’ve ever seen! The environment surrounding the village looked real, and the villagers looked very lifelike. Everything about the exhibit contributed to making it seem like I was really there. The sound of birds and animals filled the entire exhibit, and you could even see the birds and animals if you looked closely enough. My favorite part of the exhibit was the waterfall, because it was real. This exhibit was so cool that I would definitely think of going again with my parents because they never got to see it.