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Ellis Island comes to life at Calverton
Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2010
 Click here to enlarge this photo Staff photos by DARWIN WEIGEL
The Calverton School third grader Owen Flanagan, 9, was a name recorder who wrote down and often changed immigrants' names as they went through Ellis Island. The school's third graders have been studying Ellis Island and its immigration heyday at the beginning of the 20th century. They created a mockup of the process of landing at Ellis Island and eventually becoming an American citizen.
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Students at The Calverton School walked in the shoes that may have been worn by their grandparents or great-grandparents on Friday when the third grade turned the school library into a replica of Ellis Island and let much of their school community experience it.
Third grade teachers John Battye and Kristen Becker said they first had the idea about two months ago after they created a smaller version of the historic island in their classroom.
Following the initial success of that project, Becker said she and Battye had each third grader create and research the role of an immigrant landing at Ellis Island and eventually becoming an American citizen.
"They built not only a model, but also an experience that people were about to partake in," said Becker, adding that all third grade students learn about immigration in language arts and social studies classes.
She said that because she can't take the students to Ellis Island — which is located near New York City — they all brought the island to the school.
Becker said that while the roles third graders created were fictitious, they were thought up realistically to embody an early 20th century immigrant.
"They each have different reasons for coming to America … some are just leaving for business reasons, others are leaving because of the famine in Ireland … that was part of the research," Becker said.
And not all Calverton School students portrayed immigrants; to create a true-to-life replica of Ellis Island, many third graders portrayed doctors, check-in guides and boat conductors.
"My name is Megan and I'm going to be your guide today," said 9-year-old Megan McGiven of Dunkirk, who explained to her tour group that "People came to America because they heard gold was paved into the sidewalks."
Third grader Keira Shoup, 9, of Prince Frederick portrayed a doctor who checked immigrants for "lice and things that they may not be able to do work with when they come into the country.
" … It's fun doing things to the upper school kids; like we can send them to the hospital," the third grader said, adding that on a serious note, her role made her realize that, "It [was] probably really scary because they didn't have anything to do back then [for certain diseases], but now you just take a medication."
Members of a middle school group to go through "the island" had to admit that they were impressed by the detail and enthusiasm of their younger classmates.
"We're learning about it in eighth grade, we just did a paper on it and it's really cool to see them acting it out," said Katie Mather, 13, of Shady Side as she was getting her stamps to "come to America."
Katie said that as "Mandy Moore from Ireland," she got a taste of something experienced by one of her ancestors.
"My great-grandmother came from Ireland and she actually went from Ellis Island," Katie said.
Thirteen-year-old Paul Murphy of Owings said his character had fallen into some hard times.
"I'm from Ireland and my crops failed, basically," he said, adding that he was surprised by how elaborate the whole setup was.
And there were some participants who were very hesitant to break character.
"I'm playing ‘Mr. O'Hannigan,' but in real life I'm John Toole," said the third grader, who was portraying a railway conductor working at the island.
"Our job is to give people their tickets and take them to where they need to be," John, 8, who is actually a Huntingtown resident, said.
"Now excuse me, I have two customers."
