March 29, 2024
BANGOR DAILY NEWS (BANGOR, MAINE

Medieval Manners> Bangor third-graders revisit Middle Ages in a day fit for a knight

Justine Stevens, dressed in a maroon and white gown, walked up and knelt before her teacher, Deborah Friedman. Friedman drew a sword and dubbed the third-grader “Dame Justine” for her valor during a study of the Middle Ages.

A dame is the female equivalent of a knight.

“Yay, Justine. You go, girl,” shouted a parent in the audience.

The timing of the comment drew laughter from a cluster of camcorder-armed parents at the Abraham Lincoln School in Bangor. In mid-February, the group gathered to watch a special ceremony capping a six-week journey into the past for 68 third-graders.

“Tour Day” — a spectacle that likely would have forced a nod of approval from King Arthur himself — was the grand finale to a six-week study of the Middle Ages. The pageantlike day featured songs, the “knighting” of 56 third-graders and tours of a castle that has been in the works in the third-grade wing since early January.

Kings, princesses and troubadours greeted parents and friends who took time off from work to attend Tour Day. They sang songs in French, old English and Latin under the watchful eyes of music teacher Jackie Frisk and third-grade teacher-pianist David Swett. They rang bells — a popular sound during the Middle Ages.

The third-graders exercised their newly acquired medieval vocabulary, speaking about the scriptorium, a school run by church monks; the garderobe, a stone toilet with a pit cleaned by lowly workers in face masks called gongs.

Later, they gave tours of the castle, a collection of cardboard creations occupying the four third-grade classrooms. Watch out for the portcullis hanging overhead, they warned. A portcullis was a sharp-edged iron grating suspended by chains and lowered between grooves to trap enemies and bar entrance to a castle or fortified town.

The Middle Ages was a period in European history stretching from the fifth to the 15th centuries, following the collapse of Roman civilization. Also known as the medieval era, the time spawned tales of King Arthur and his Lady Guinevere, the knights of the Round Table and Merlin the magician. Castles loomed out of misty fields. Robin Hood ruled the forest.

It was a rowdy, tempestuous age — fine fodder for 8- and 9-year-olds in Bangor, getting tired of winter and ready to stretch their imaginations. As snowbanks formed outside, the young scholars turned up the academic heat inside.

Under the watchful eyes of third-grade teachers Swett, Friedman, Jewel Stevens and Vanessa Viner, the children learned about the royalty and common people who occupied Europe during the Middle Ages. They talked about kings, queens, jesters and minstrels. They heard stories about Sir Gwain, a particularly bold knight. They learned how many of their own European ancestors lived, worked and treated illnesses.

For teacher David Swett, nearly a decade ago, it was a search into his own lineage that spurred him to suggest a study of medieval times. In his own quest, he had discovered that he was related to King John of England. To his surprise, he also found he was related to the English barons who forced the ruler to sign the Magna Carta in 1215. The document granted certain civil and political liberties.

Swett began talking about the appeal the Middle Ages might hold for pupils at the school. But it was Marie Gass, an enrichment teacher at the school, who finally galvanized Swett and his colleagues into action in 1991.

“She said, `Instead of talking about it, go ahead and do it,”‘ Swett said with a smile. “Do it” turned into a rallying cry for a massive project that has turned into an annual event in its eighth year.

This year, third-graders and their parents created crowns and costumes at night. By day, they turned their paintbrushes on huge posterlike drawings of knights and castles.

The school’s institutional-green walls disappeared beneath a cloth covering designed to look like a castle’s stone walls.

Karen Linehan, a mother of three with an art background, spent hours enlarging drawings of knights, kings and ministers, which the youngsters then painted.

Tanya Erickson, a children’s librarian at the Bangor Public Library, provided historical perspective.

Even school Principal Bill Armstrong got into the act, splicing together bits of movies that were part of an hourlong presentation on the fantasy and reality of life in the Middle Ages.

Armstrong praised the teachers for undertaking the medieval unit that wove together history, literature and other subjects. He said the value of this approach is supported by research and by Year 2000 goals cited in a report issued by the Bangor School Department.

Psychological research has shown “people learn best when they feel connected to what they’re studying,” Armstrong said.

“The kids get stimulated. The trick is not just to weave in activities but to make sure that the themes that come out are what you want to stress academically,” he said.

The project has left the children with a variety of impressions of the Middle Ages.

Heidi Godinez, 8 1/2, said she liked working on a mural of a kennel where hunting dogs were kept. The paper puppies she painted were named Fudge and Rollie.

Jacob Wood, 9, said he had read a lot of books on the Middle Ages and recalled tales of “torture, like they put a board over prisoners to crush them sometimes and if that didn’t work they put weights on top of it.”

Kate Dana, 9, said she would especially remember making the castle that took so many hours of craftsmanship.


Have feedback? Want to know more? Send us ideas for follow-up stories.

comments for this post are closed

You may also like