Hello! My name is Corinne, I am one of two summer students working for The Old Log Church Museum this summer. I am originally from Windsor, Ontario, and I am attending the University of Windsor for music education. I got the amazing opportunity to come up to the Yukon for the summer.
Although the museum is closed, a lot goes on behind the scenes, and I have gotten the chance to learn a lot. I have gotten to do research on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and find resources to create a culturally responsive and relevant exhibit in the future. I have also learned about the different types of learners that come into museums. They are similar to students in classrooms, but their characteristics are harder to identify. As a future educator, I think it is important to understand your audience, while having the ability to cater the experience to them is more rewarding in the end.
Right now, I am helping my coworker, Taylor, put the finishing touches on a board game that she created last year for families to play as part of an educational backpack we are putting together. We have spent the last few days testing and retesting the game, making sure that it is fun, educational, and functional. I think that families will really enjoy playing this game when it is out!
One of the other things I have been doing is organizing and creating more resources for “Education Kits.” These are boxes with unit and lesson plans that teachers can rent out, and teach to their students. There are boxes on maps, Herschel Island, Rampart House, instruments during the Gold Rush, and several more. Each box is like opening up a treasure chest, and they all have their own little golden nuggets! I am learning a lot just from gathering information for each of these boxes.
One of the ongoing projects I am working on is digitizing an index of the Anglican church’s publication called “Northern Lights.” It is an Anglican newsletter subscription that started in 1913. This subscription updated small communities on what the each community was up to across the Yukon and the Northwest Territories. There are some cases where I get to read the issues of the newsletter, and I get to learn about how different their lives were back before my time.
When I first started working here, I thought it would be paperwork, sitting at a desk all day, and staring at a computer screen until I went cross-eyed. That is just not true! I am in an environment where information and history is all around me, and I am very excited to see what I get to learn tomorrow, and next week, and next month. I hope that this inspires someone to go out and learn something new today, because history does not live in a book, it exists around us.
