Presenting at NCGE, Vancouver, B.C., Canada, August, 2001
WHAT IS MAIN STREET, U.S.A.?
Main Street, U.S.A. is a day-long, in-school geographic "field trip" for fourth and fifth graders. Each field trip is based on a region of the United States: The Northeast, The Southeast, The Midwest, The Southwest, The West, *Hawaii, *Alaska and **Washington, D.C.
* Available to Hawaii and Alaska in 2002.
** Washington D.C.'s in-school geographic & quot and field trip & quot is in progress at this time.
HOW DOES GEOGRAPHY FIT INTO THE PROJECT?
Students complete activities that are geography based. Nearly every activity has a literature piece to accompany it. Activities incorporate such areas as history, cooking, archaeology, crafts, science, math, art, paleontology, communication, writing and listening.
HOW CAN PARENTS BECOME INVOLVED WITH THE PROJECT?
Main Street, U.S.A. provides an opportunity to involve adults to interact with students. While parents may provide the main source of active leadership, other adults may also be utilized. Older adults, community leaders, and business partners also make excellent activity facilitators.
ASSESSMENT?
Each region has a pretest and post test that could be given by the classroom teacher. If the classroom teacher wants further assessment, a KWL chart can be part of this process. Expository, technical, persuasive, and narrative writing can be utilized to assess progress.
COMMUNICATION?
E-mailing students in the actual region can be a learning experience for students. (People can also volunteer to be e-mail partners also)
ALIGNMENT?
The entire program is aligned with most social studies and language arts programs for fourth grade and fifth grade. Main Street, U.S.A. is also based on three pieces of research: Jensen's Brain Research, Gardner's Multiple Intelligences, and Dever and Hobbs' Learning Spiral.
HOW CAN I GET INVOLVED?
Each individual region has been field tested at least once. Further field testing is welcomed. If you are interested, please e-mail Don Everhart at cdeverhart@juno.com or write to Don Everhart, Main Street, U.S.A., 3 Holly Drive, Olathe, KS 66062. Only costs will be copying materials and postage.
WHO DEVELOPED THE LESSONS?
Don Everhart researched and developed the lessons for the project. Everhart taught thirty-six years in the Olathe School District, Olathe, Kansas. He is now teaching fifth grade at Hillsdale Elementary, Paola School District, Hillsdale, Kansas. He has a Bachelor of Science in Elementary Education and a Master of Science in Curriculum and Instruction. Everhart received the bulk of his geography education in 1991 in Washington, D.C. with the National Geographic Society. Everhart was selected Kansas Teacher of the Year in 1974 and was recognized with the Kansas Young Bankers Award in 1986. He received the National Council for Geographic Education Distinguished Teaching Award in 1994. Everhart currently is working on the Lewis and Clark units for MCREL and National Geographic Society in conjunction with NASA and the University of Montana.