Race & Place In Bay Ridge

When teaching local history to students, it provides a great opportunity to look at the history of schools in the area. There is a rich history of how education has developed to what it is today, and the New York City board of Education is one of the largest Departments in the entire country.  By exploring what going to school was like in the past, students can receive a better understanding of what life was like in general in the past. It also helps personify the experience as students will be able to truly understand the issues that kids like them faced in the past.  In looking at Bay Ridge, it is best to divide the schools by school type. As in Education there are Public schools, which are federally funded and free for all students. The New York City Department of Education must follow the state and federal guidelines as far as curriculums and programming. There is also private schools which can be either parochial (faith based) or a private institution where the individual...

Local history can sometimes be a difficult topic during transition periods in history. While there are massive changes occurring on a global scale, it is important to see how local towns and villages adapted and existed in the context of these large historical events. When these instances occur, it is important to locate any and all information that is available to help fill in these gaps. A great resource would be maps, as often time insurance or even fire department maps can help provide insights into a particular area.  One of the best resources for maps is the Center for Brooklyn History's website.  Here students have access to viewing hundreds of maps of Brooklyn, ranging from the 18th century to today. This can be a WebQuest activity, as well as a guided practice for students to engage with their neighborhoods. According to a Development and Evaluation of an Interactive WebQuest Environment: “Web Macerasi by Yasemin Gülbahar, R. Orcun Madran and Filiz Kalelioglu, "W...

 One of the main goals in the world of education today is to enhance the skill of metacognition, or be aware of one's thinking process. This is a skill that teachers are to help students to grasp, as it can be very helpful in self-awareness in the learning process as well as general classroom setting. When students practice metacognition, it can help them understand content material in a better way (I know this is the answer because ... or I got this question wrong because I did this instead of that).  By practicing metacognition, students are more aware of their strengths and weaknesses, and can better help themselves to improve on their academic work and understandings.  A great activity to explore metacognition would be to have students interview others. This can be through almost any discipline area, especially the history discipline. By having students interview actual participants and witnesses to historical events, it can help broaden their understanding of the eve...

One of the greatest ways to make the past relevant to younger generations is to create connections between their surroundings to the past. Teachers and educators can take what students have in their immediate surroundings, and help them make comparisons to the past. The teacher can provide activities such as Venn diagrams, where the students can learn to compare and contrast topics. In doing practices like this, the students can work on their comparison skills and help connect the past to their present day experiences. When the teacher is able to guide the students in the right direction, and they can make the connection or comparison themselves, higher order thinking skills can be achieved.  A way that teachers can help foster the connection of past to present would be to take students on a field trip of their local train station, or the  New York Transit Museum . The New York Transit Museum has a wide range of exhibits that show students how the train cars have changed over ...