The Next Step
In This Section
There's No Other Museum Like It - and Kids Did It All
Incredible Free Resources from NASA
There's No Other Museum Like It - and Kids Did It All
Scott County has truly been blessed. Winning a half million dollar RUS Grant to fund a distance learning initiative was only the beginning of one of the most dramatic years in school history.
* What about this RUS grant? The USDA gives educational and medical institutes the opportunity to apply each year for competitive grants called Rural Utilities Services Distance Learning & Telemedicine Grants.
Scott County had three specific goals in their 2005 application:
1. To eliminate bussing students to the high school to take Algebra One
2. To offer dual credit colleges courses delivered directly to the Scott High campus.
3. To promote the Museum of Scott County by offering a virtual field trip (VFT)
To help us achieve our third goal: to promote Museum of Scott County Virtual Field Trips, we decided to utilize online publications like this CILC E-News.
About the Museum
The only one of its kind in America, the Museum of Scott County is located on the campus of Scott High School in Huntsville, Tennessee. Currently hundreds of school children from around Scott County and east Tennessee tour this unique facility each year.
Hundreds of other visitors have made the trek to tour the facilities as well, including visitors who come to Friday night football games. This gives a whole new meaning to Friday Night Lights as these guests tour the nearby Museum before or after the game or even during halftime.
Ohio residents, Paul Dawson and family, decided to donate their entire collection of USS Tennessee memorabilia. Paul, the son of one of the official photographers of this battleship, had such a vast collection that it took a second log structure to hold it. This facility was donated by Barna Log Homes® and built by Scott High School students right next to the original museum. The Dawsons were so impressed they moved to the region and now act as tour guides for the new USS Tennessee Museum.
Its Uniqueness
- The museum was completely constructed by the building trades students at Scott High from logs donated by a local manufacturing facility.
- It is staffed by drama students who take on the role and dress the part of characters of the time period as they give personal tours of each exhibit
- The museum is filled with exhibits of materials dug up in Anthropology class, constructed by students in art or computing classes, or donated by citizens throughout the region.
- The floral gardens and walking trails are landscaped and maintained by students in horticulture class who also raise the farm animals./li>
The Exhibits
Several exhibits that change frequently inside the museum are the:
- moonshine stills that demonstrate the scientific methods used to produce this illegal corn liquor
- underground and strip coal mining
- Native American scenes
- frontier days in Scott County
- Scott County at War: artifacts from every war since the Civil War
- famous crimes of Scott County
- authentic 100+ year old one-room school where drama students “teach” classes to visitors
What Others Are Saying
The reputation of the museum is rapidly spreading. When several school system administrators from across Tennessee and Kentucky made the trip to see some of Scott County’s distance learning initiatives, the museum was one of their favorite stops. Each left the tour stating that they would be sending their students to visit this one-of-a-kind facility, either live or virtual!
Won’t You Join Us?
In 2006 the first ever Heritage Festival was held on the grounds of the Museum. Approximately 4,000 people came to enjoy the festivities which included: storytelling, molasses stir-off, games, music, contests, and more. This year’s Heritage Festival was held on September 22, with an estimated total attendance of 4,500.
Look for a virtual field trip offering of this fantastic educational opportunity this fall.
It will be entitled Museum of Scott County and can be found by visiting www.cilc.org and searching under Content Provider Programs.
About the Authors
Gary Sexton is the Museum Curator and teaches Anthropology at Scott County Schools.
C. Michael Lay is the Technology Coordinator at Scott County Schools
Learn more about the Museum
Incredible Free Resources from NASA
On August 4, 2007 I received a note from Dr. Laura Blasi, an evaluation specialist at Saint Leo University near Tampa, Florida. For the past four years, while at the University of Central Florida, her research focused on high school science in low-income classrooms, specifically using the Virtual Lab simulation developed by NASA Kennedy Space Center.
The Note
Hello -
NASA has developed a few educational games (downloadable or online) and other educational resources from the finding of our research in low-income schools. You can find these free resources on www.NASA-inspired.org (See 10 projects here)
I am writing to ask you to share this link with middle and high school science teachers working in the Science Technology, Engineering & Mathematics (STEM) fields. The resources all support the integration of NASA’s Virtual Lab, which is a suite of advanced microscopes (a simulation).
Be sure to look at Mercury 13 which is a downloadable game. I think you will find it beautiful and fun, too.
This week here we will have the launch of the Endeavor Shuttle, which is a momentous occasion – as they send up a teacher who has been affiliated with NASA for the past 20 years.
I hope NASA Inspired helps you and your colleagues to help students to be inspired by science and to be part of that next generation.
Many thanks,
Laura
My Thoughts
After reading the note, I clicked on the URL. Here I found ten (10) projects "designed to strengthen science teaching and learning from NASA to inspire the next generation of exploration and innovation." All of these are available free to teachers and their students.
Perhaps these resources could be used within collaborative projects between classrooms.
CILC thanks Laura for giving us the opportunity to share these incredible resources with all our members.
Contact Laura Blasi.