For Teachers

The idea of spending two days with your students, overnighting in a sleeping bag in the ballroom of a historic mansion may not be the most appealing for a good night’s sleep, but for learning Denver’s history, there’s nothing to beat it. And Denver Discovery Camp wants to make sure you have the resources to make the most of the experience, and make your work as easy and profitable as possible. Once you have signed up for Denver Discovery Camp you will be provided with the following items:

BEFORE Denver Discovery Camp

Pre-materials (including Four Mile Park activity descriptions) that will introduce your students to the places, faces and activities that will make up their time. There will be songs to chant while churning butter, and questions for the students to look for during the two-day camp. And students will get to choose a role to fill, assignments to complete during Denver Discovery Camp. These various tasks will allow each student to choose the task that is most appealing. These tasks include:

Projects for Your Students

1. Front Page of the Rocky Mountain News! It’s 1906 and your students will be given a template for an edition of Denver’s original paper and the assignment to keep their eyes and ears open for the news! They’ll fill it in, give it to us and we will provide you with an edition of the Rocky Mountain News, complete with a front page article of your class’ ‘visit to the past!’
2. A Picture’s Worth a Thousand Words! Your students get to be photojournalists for the day, taking pictures that will be included in the Rocky Mountain News edition prepared for your class, and cataloguing the color and breadth of the day. Single-use cameras will be provided.
3. The Story of the Century! The edition of the Rocky Mountain News provided to your class will feature an article about your class’ time at Denver Discovery Camp. Those who choose this project will take notes over the course of the day and compose a front-page article for the paper.
4. Art Is the Best Time Machine! If your students’ have an artistic bent, they can provide hand-drawn renderings of some of the events described during their travels with Denver Discovery Camp. These will be used in the final edition of the Rocky Mountain News you will receive, standing in for events, sometimes shocking, always newsworthy, that can no longer be captured in film.
5. The Society Page: the Gossip-About-Town! These students will be able to interview the folks of Denver they encounter along their route, including museum staff, hotel concierges/doormen, character actors at museums, and other students who have taken historical roles as part of an event. These tidbits will be included in the Rocky Mountain News as all the talk from about town.
6. Learning the Lay of the Land! Students who like numbers and cold, hard facts can act as Surveyors, measuring and calculating for the ‘government of the Kansas Territory’ --- of which we were a part when Denver started --- various assigned elements along the route; just how many steps are there at the Capitol …how long is 16^th Street from Union Station to Broadway, and other important figures that will allow them to fill in a map of their journey, to be included in the Rocky Mountain News edition for your class.

DURING Denver Discovery Camp

You and your chaperones will be with a guide at all times except during the activities at the Four Mile House. The program offered at Denver’s oldest home has the teachers and chaperones conducting the various activities. Your guide will help you get started, then move amongst the groups making sure that everything is going well. The activities at the Four Mile House are currently Pioneer Chores, Butter Making and Gold Panning, though these may change as programs are shuffled at the location. You and two of your chaperones will be leading the children in these activities. Descriptions of each activity and how to conduct them will be sent to you prior to the event so that you may be ready to go!

AFTER Denver Discovery Camp

The pictures, stories, interviews and other items produced by your students will be consolidated into a souvenir edition of the Rocky Mountain News, circa 1906, that will be sent to you and your class, a wonderful way to remember your two days immersed in Denver’s history. Additionally, you will receive testing materials for your students, just to make sure they were taking it all in!

Kevin@denverhistorytours.com