The BES third grade has been studying communities around the world. The third grade team of Ms. Rontey, Mrs. Peter-Hoen, Mrs.V Healy and Mr. Bourquard planned a trip to Hancock Shaker Village in Massachusetts to tie into the unit study. This was an opportunity to see first hand how one of the communities lived. The students had studied the Puritan community (Pilgrims) so at Hancock Shaker Village, they were able to compare life as a Shaker to the life of a Pilgrim. The students visited the school house, the tannery, the Shaker gardens and the round barn where the baby animals were housed.
Mrs. Peter-Hoen’s class reflected on their favorite parts of the trip and what they learned. Below you will find a few student reflections.
Hancock Shaker Village
by Louie Gardell
What l learned at Hancock Shaker Village:
- I learned that it is almost 200 years old.
- They have a lot of animals including pigs, cows, chickens, and more.
- A few Shakers still live today.
- They made apple cider by cutting the apples and smashing it!
- The shakers used no electricity for a really long time
- I know that they have over 150 different crops.
- Children over 6 would be in school for 3 months in the summer if a boy, and 3 months in the winter if a girl.
Things I liked best at Hancock Shaker Village!
By Summer Levin
- I really liked seeing the brick dwelling, it was so cool to look at! I liked seeing the bedrooms and the kitchen, it was so cool being in a house that people used to live in back then! I learned that in that house there was a boy side and a girl side of the house. Also instead of carrying food up the stairs (because the dining room was up stairs) they made a shelf that you put food on and you pulled a rope and the shelf would go to the next floor, because there were about 100 people who lived in that house!
- I also liked the school house! We learned that girls went to school in the summer so the boys could do farm work, and the boys went to school in winter so the girls could learn how to sew and do laundry.
- I liked going through the animal farm place, the roosters were funny! But my favorite were the baby pigs and baby goats. Everyone was chasing the chickens (including me).
- We also went to the tannery. At first, it looked like a wood shop (because it was) but in the olden days it was a cider making building. The guy brought us down in the basement and that was where they put the mashed up apples and turned it into Cider. Also down there was a coal fire room. I forgot what it was, but we passed around a piece of coal and that’s all I can remember.
Hancock Shaker Village
By Armond Denue
My favorite place was the Round Stone Barn. I really liked the cows. We really learned so much! I learned that Shakers used chalk instead of paper. They told us how girls go to school over the summer and boys go in the winter. The Shakers sold cheese to people for money.
Hancock Shaker Village
by: Addison Dezess
- The chicken coop had 15 windows facing south and only 4 facing north so sun could heat the coop for better chickens and eggs.
- I learned that the boys would go to school in winter and girls in the summer.
- The Brick Dwelling is where the kids lived. There where about 100 kids that lived in the brick dwelling
- Everybody had a job. Every day of the year everybody worked. Kids, Women, and Men.
- A Dumbwaiter is a shelf that can go from one floor to the next.
- Dumb means cannot talk. Waiter means someone or thing that brings food.
- The Shakers made medicine for EVERY illness.