School in the Past

"In the past, they have dirty chairs and tables." - Grade 1-A "All students had no fun in the past. They always worked and worked." - Grade 1-B "They ddidn't have pencil. They wrote using the feather of a bird." - Grade 1-C These were only a few of the impressions that Grade 1s shared when I asked them about schools a long time ago. It was actually funny to discover that I had similar impressions of schools in the past when I was their age. To check if their impressions were correct and to better understand how school in the past really was, we explored by asking the adults at present about how their life was at school when they were young. We also watched videos of the school scenes in the past. We read texts about students' school life in the past and even did a simulation of it for one unit block. Afterwards, the students compared and contrasted schools in the past and schools at present using Venn diagram. "School now is more fun. Children have play time." "Teachers are nice now." "Like in the past, we also learn how to read, write and add numbers." These are some of their answers in the reflection.