What Have We Been Up To?
Our blog is woefully behind in the times. Only two posts in nearly 3 months? It’s most disappointing, and for that I apologize.
“But Michelle,” you may ask, “if you haven’t been blogging, then what have you and the other museum staff been doing??”
Well, let see…
July 7: “Dr. Carver’s Lab” children’s workshop and “Vietnam Syndrome” adult program in Dubuque
July 7: “Eat Your Way Through Africa” children’s workshop in Muscatine
July 8: “Summer Chama” Learning Safari at Hiawatha Library
July 11-15: “Secrets of the Underground Railroad” week-long Summer Camp at AAMI
July 11: “Vietnam Syndrome” adult discussion in Iowa City
July 19: Guided tours of the galleries
July 20: Guided tours of the galleries
July 21: Training seminar for Education staff called “Effective Instruction Methods”
July 24-July27: Michelle and Lynn at Midwest Museum Association Conference
July 26: “My Friend the Buffalo Soldier” adult presentation in Des Moines
July 27: “Battle within the Barracks” adult presentation in Council Bluffs
July 28: “My Friend the Buffalo Soldier” re-enactment at AAMI
August 1-3: Michelle and Tenika attend a teacher training to better understand the needs of Cedar Rapids teachres
August 2: Guided tours of museum
August 8-12: “Secrets of the Underground Railroad” week long summer camp
August 11: Staff represents museum at General Mills Diversity Day in shifts from 12-4am, 10am-2pm, and 4-8pm
August 16: “Red Tails” children’s program and “My Friend the Buffalo Soldier” adult presentation in Sioux City
August 18: Meeting with Davenport Schools to discuss programming for preschoolers
August 22: “Unconditional Loyalty” adult program in Fort Dodge
August 24: “Super Soaked” workshop and exhibit tours at museum
August 30: “Unconditional Loyalty” adult presentation and “Mysteries of Ancient Egypt” children’s program in Ottumwa
August 31: “Super Soaked” children’s workshop here, “Unconditional Loyalty” adult presentation in Davenport
September 2: “Exploding Volcanoes” Learning Safari at Hiawatha Library
September 6: Staff meets to discuss future Statewide Programming
September 7: Michelle and Tenika represent museum at Big Red Rally in Marion
September 9: Grant begins compiling information for the next “Iowa Griot”
September 14: Guided tours of the museum
September 17: Michelle and Tenika present “History in the Park” at Forest Avenue Library in Des Moines, Museum Staff/Board have annual meeting and social.
September 19-20: Michelle and Tenika give a workshop to every preschooler in Davenport school district
September 21: Staff presents about Museum Jobs at local Middle School, the travels to Dubuque for teen workshop on the Harlem Renaissance
September 22: After months of preparation, the AAMI throws a successful semi-formal event, our annual History Makers Gala
September 23: Hundreds of women attend our African American Women’s Leadership Conference
September 24: Tour of museum
September 26: Journey to Freedom rehearsal
September 27: Guided tours at museum, “Super Soaked” children’s workshop at Muscatine
September 28: Guided tours at museum, Journey to Freedom rehearsal
September 29: “Meet the Inventors” children’s workshop in Muscatine, museum staff preps Journey to Freedom materials
September 30: 3rd Annual “Journey to Freedom” School Day has record participation
October 1: “Journey to Freedom” event has more than 75 people registered and 100 people in attendance
October 5: all third grade classes from two elementary schools visit, keeping Michelle and Tenika busy all day
In conclusion, we’ve been busy! We’ll still be busy, but the school year tends to offer a more stable schedule, so please look for more frequent blog updates in the near future. Thank you for your understanding and support!
Welcome Tenika
Hi Everyone!
My name is Tenika Johnson and I’m the new Assistant Educator here at the African American Museum of Iowa. I am a native of Richmond, Virginia and received a degree in accounting from North Carolina A&T State University in 2007. I came to Iowa in 2008 to begin my career and spent a little over three years in the Accounting profession. Because I enjoy working with both numbers and people, I recently decided to switch to a profession that will allow me to do both. I felt joining the team here at the museum would be an excellent way of increasing my interaction with people as I work on my Master of Business Administration at the University of Iowa. I’ll be assisting with statewide education programs for children as well as interacting with librarians and community advisory groups for adult programming. I look forward to learning all there is to know about the history of African Americans in Iowa so I can share it with others!
Tenika 
Engaged Learning
Over the weekend, the Cedar Rapids community celebrated Juneteenth at Viola Gibson Park. There was live music, food, a bouncy castle, vendors, and a number of children’s activities. One of my favorite parts was the “Timeline to the Past”. Whether you’re a grown up or a child, it seems most people have difficulty with deciding what events happened before or after other events in history. The “Timeline to the Past” is a simple concept: there are signs staked into the ground marking every 50 years between 1750 and 2000, then small flags with a year and event in American history. As families arrive at the timeline, they are given new flags to add. Throughout the day, we saw moms, dads, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and even a few teenagers walking through the timeline, reading the events in order and calling out to each other with things like “Oh look, here’s when Rosa Parks sat on the bus” or “So the NAACP was founded after the Tuskegee Institute, I didn’t know that.”
One of the best parts of my job is watching people engaged with history. Too often history is painted as a stagnant, boring topic, when in fact it’s anything but.
Archaeology
Teaching about Archaeology is fun. Many of the students who enter the museum already have a basic idea of what an archaeologist does, and how they do it, but there are always a few misconceptions to dispel and new information to give. Here are 5 pieces of information about archaeologists:
1. Archaeologists don’t look for dinosaurs.
Archaeologists look for artifacts: objects that have been made or altered by human beings. Dinosaur bones are not artifacts. The person who studies dinos is a paleontologist.
2. Archaeologists don’t just grab a shovel and start digging.
To make an important archaeological find, archaeologists study, often for years, to discern exactly what they’re looking for and where they’re most likely to find it. Taking a shovel to your backyard and starting to dig is not the best way to yield results.
3. The lower in the ground, the older it is.
This isn’t an entirely fool-proof method, but generally speaking, it’s true. Archaeologists use the principal of stratigraphy to find the relative date of an artifact. An Educator at the Lake County Discovery Museum in Illinois said to think of is this way: if you come home from school each day and change out of you school clothes, placing the current outfit on top of the old ones, you will eventually have a pile that looks like this:
Friday’s clothes
Thursday’s clothes
Wednesday’s clothes
Tuesday’s clothes
Monday’s clothes
As you can see, the oldest clothes are on the bottom. This = stratigraphy.
4. Archaeology is a destructive process.
This was a revelation to me when taking an archaeology class in college. Archaeology is destructive. Once you excavate a site, it cannot be excavated again. This means we didn’t get as much information from an area we dug up 50 years ago as we would if it’d been done today, due to advances in technology. There are two main repercussion of this. One is that many times archaeologists today will only excavate (dig) part of a site, and will use geothermal and other noninvasive technology to study the rest. The second repercussion is…
5. Archaeologists write down everything.
Before they dig, they create a North-facing grid with string and stakes. Everything about an artifact is carefully measured using the metric system, including the position within the grid it was located, how far below ground it was found, it’s distance from other artifacts, and the exact dimensions of the item itself. The more that’s written down now, the more useful the information will be in the future. Archaeology is not a sprint–it’s a marathon.
The Underground Railroad in Your House
Though this wouldn’t have been the experience of freedom seekers escaping through Iowa, this is an interesting children’s game about the Underground Railroad by National Geographic:
Homeschoolers, too
With so many traditional school students visiting museums on field trips, people often forget Homeschoolers are an important part of the mix. In February, we offered our first Homeschool Day with great success! We’re hoping to offer programs just for Homeschool students twice a semester, and our next event is just around the corner. On Wednesday, May 11, join us for free admission in the morning and a workshop all about archaeology in the afternoon. Don’t forget, registration is required!
Meet the Carolina Chocolate Drops
First of all, before you read this, click the link to NPR and start streaming the song “Knockin’”. Today’s blog is a musical experience.
LINK
If you follow us on Facebook or check our homepage, you’ve probably noticed that we’re hosting the Carolina Chocolate Drops here next Tuesday, April 4 at 7:00. They’re going to be talking about the music they play, as well as performing some of it to show what they’re talking about. String Band instruments have a long and rich history, being traced back to Africa before the slave trade. Variations of the banjo, for example, can be found in Africa, the Caribbean, and Latin America as well as North America. When you come next Tuesday, you are likely to hear many of the instruments in the song your listening to and more. The Chocolate Drops music contains banjo, fiddle, jug, kazoo, mandolin, bones, beatbox (vocal percussion), singing, and more.
Hooked?
Good. Then we’ll plan on seeing you next Tuesday at our house.
A Little Fun in Your Inbox
As the African American Museum of Iowa, it’s our goal to make Iowa’s African American History accessible to everyone. One of the ways we’re doing this is through a newsletter designed to assist teacher looking to integrate more history into their classrooms. Our monthly Teacher Newsletter gives teachers (and anyone else interested in receiving it!) a brief lesson about a relevant topic, along with activities for students of all ages.
Interested in receiving this newsletter? Click the link to join: Sign Up Here
It’s Important to Remember
“People need to remember not just what they want, but what they need.”
The December issue of the American Museum Association’s magazine included a very interesting and pertinent article titled “People Need to Remember: American museums still struggle with the legacy of race” by Lonnie G. Bunch III. The article explores reasons why museums included or don’t include African American history in their exhibits. Of the museums that do include African Americans, many will just highlight a few African American leaders. Bunch writes “museums are too often crafting exhibitions that simply say, “African Americans were here, too,” rather than examining the complexities, interactions and difficulties of race in America.”
This is a perspective matches that of the African American Museum of Iowa. As we frequently tell visitors, teachers, and other museum supporters, African American history IS American history. You cannot tell the story of the United States without it. As we leave Black History Month, this is particularly important to remember. It’s great to have such an increased interest in Iowa’s African American History in February, but don’t forget about it the other 11 months of the year. Studying African American history isn’t always easy: slavery, racism, and discrimination are difficult concepts explore and understand, but just as Bunch’s article says “People need to remember not just what they want, but what they need.”
To read the “People Need to Remember” for yourself, go here: Link.
Africa is Not a Country
As we’re preparing for Celebrate Africa! on Saturday, I have been looking for games, foods, crafts, and other fun activities to accompany the Giant Map of Africa (26′ by 35′) the museum is borrowing from National Geographic. My search has led me to discover that there is a lot of misinformation out there, so I want to take a moment to set a few of the facts straight.
#1. Africa is Not a Country
Contrary to popular belief, Africa is not a country. It is a continent. In fact, it’s so big that Africa is 3.5 times larger than the United States and is home to more than 50 different countries. Want to test your African Geography knowledge? Try an Africa Map Puzzle
#2. Africa is Not the Same Everywhere
Think about the lush forest scenery shown in the Disney movie “The Lion King”. Ok, now imagine of the endless sands surrounding the Pyramids of Giza. Now picture a tropical island with white sandy beaches, palm trees, and blue skies. All of these, and more, can be found in Africa.
#3. Africa has Cities
I went into a classroom last spring to talk to the students about African cultures (see #4), and when I read a story where a young girl rides in a car through town, they were flabbergasted. Most didn’t want to believe me when I told them some people in Africa had cars. The following is a list of other things the 4th graders were surprised to learn one can find in Africa: apartment buildings, large cities, golf, McDonalds, jeans, tennis shoes/sneakers, cell phones, movie theaters, playgrounds, computers/internet, and video games. I should mention that these items are not everywhere, but to imagine that everyone in Africa lives in a thatch hut without running water or electricity is inaccurate.
#4. African Cultures are Diverse
The variety of cultures in Africa is simply amazing. Just look at the variation you find in African masks: some sit on top of the head and some cover the face. Some resemble animals, some look like people, and others are unearthly. The materials used, who wears them, when they are are worn, how they are kept… All of these vary by culture and location in the vast continent.
#5. No One Speaks African
There are 100′s of different languages across the continent, from French and Arabic to Swahili and Hausa. But, much like no one in Europe speaks “European”, no one in Africa speaks “African”.
Have I piqued your interested?
Be sure to come on Saturday, February 5 to Celebrate Africa!
