Cram Middle School students learn about Civil War through re-enactment
What better way for students to learn about the Civil War than to participate in it?
Nearly 250 seventh-graders at Cram Middle School, 1900 W. Deer Springs Way, battled for three hours last month as Union and Confederate soldiers. Water-soaked sponges substituted for musket and cannon fire.
The students, decked out in replica uniforms, formed regiments and brigades and marched and performed the same war tactics as the soldiers did 150 years earlier.
The event was sponsored by the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the Southern Nevada Living History Association and state park volunteers.
Accelerated history teacher Matt Funston and accelerated English and reading teacher Barbara Godby used the event as incentive to engage students in the subject matter they were learning.
“What I really enjoyed about the activity,” Funston said, “is that it incorporated English, reading and history. It taught them the importance of working as a unit, following orders and discipline. It went beyond just the text and put them into the role of a soldier. They learned all those interpersonal things you need to know to work with others.”
Godby’s students read Civil War literature and are preparing research essays this month on a Civil War-related topic of their choice.
Last month’s battle featured students from Funston’s and Godby’s classes, but they would like to include all 500 seventh-graders in a spring battle. They want to use the event as incentive for students, who would have to qualify through grades and behavior.
Ideally, they said, fall and spring Civil War battles would become a Cram tradition.
The Veterans of Foreign Wars School Civil War Education Program started three years ago at Hinman and Ullom elementary schools in the Henderson area. Retired Army Master Sgt. Jim Edwards and others in VFW Post 983 visited the schools as part of the Veterans in the Classroom program.
Burkholder Middle School in Henderson hosted a battle last May, too. The city of Henderson approached the VFW about hosting a battle between Burkholder and another middle school this year, Edwards said.
Eventually, Edwards said, he would like to spread the program to every school in the Clark County School District. Over time, he and other volunteers are becoming more efficient at training students.
Edwards’ experience at Cram showed him that students could learn in six to nine hours what used to take 12 to 14. Edwards and others trained students for three days leading up to the battles.
“We were tickled pink,” Edwards said of the experience at Cram. “We’re trying to get down to where you can show up in the morning and by the afternoon form units to fight a battle.”
Students are expected to admit when they are hit by a sponge and die accordingly. Students also must wait at least 20 seconds before firing a shot, about the time it took to reload a musket. And students must follow orders and stay in formation.
“We want to teach them as much as we can about leadership, honor, integrity and flexibility,” Edwards said. “We’re not going to tell you what the Civil War was like, we’re going to show you. That’s kind of our objective in a nutshell.”
These Civil War re-enactments can even be useful in math classes.
Cram students are measuring the arc and distance of the artillery weapons to improve students’ accuracy in future battles.
“This tests them in so many ways we haven’t even realized how much they’re learning out there,” Edwards said. “It teaches them things that will bleed over into real life.”
At the end of the day, after hundreds of casualties, the fighting stopped. Both sides met in the middle and applauded one another.
Contact View education reporter Jeff Mosier at jmosier@viewnews.com or 224-5524.
