On a brisk,
overcast November day, 64 fourth grade students arrived at Howard County’s
Belmont Manor and Historic Park for the first “Rock Hunters” field trip of the
season. Filled with excitement and an eagerness to learn the kids were already
brimming with questions about what they would experience. This day was months
in the making. In September, I began an internship with the Howard County
Conservancy to help enhance the “Rock Hunters” lesson, and now we were running
it for the first time.
 |
| Carriage House at Belmont Manor and Historic Park |
For those that do not know, the Howard County Conservancy is a local, non-profit environmental education center and land trust. Dedicated to educating youth and adults about environmental stewardship and ecosystems, the Conservancy focuses its programs on local animal and plant life found in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. The Conservancy has been educating Howard County youth since 1997, and has been an Educational Partner with the Howard County Public School System since 2003.
The Conservancy provides environmental education programs at two
locations, one at Mt. Pleasant Farm in Woodstock and the other at Howard
County’s Belmont Manor and Historic Park in Elkridge. The second, location at
Howard County’s Belmont Manor and Historic Park, is a newly acquired location.
Howard County Government purchased Belmont Manor and Historic Park to ensure
the stewardship of the beautiful 68 acres, intact with a historic 1738 Manor
House, formal gardens, barn and smokehouse. As a new site, the Howard County
Conservancy is looking to expand their opportunities at the Belmont Manor and
Historic Park. The location holds deep ties to local history and the
surrounding community and The Conservancy would like to include these ties in
their program offerings.
 |
| To give the idea of Iron Smelting. "Casting pig Iron, Iroquois smelter, Chicago." |
As part of my internship, I help tell the story of the Industrial
Revolution in Patapsco River Valley, the Dorsey family role in the growth and
the lasting environmental impact. Currently, The Conservancy discusses the use
of Iron Works through Industrial Revolution in Patapsco River Valley and its
relation to storm water run-off, including a professional display board with
mineral manipulatives for Charcoal, Limestone, Iron Ore, Slag, and Pig Iron.
However, they wish to deepen this connection and expand the history and social
studies connections to reach more Howard County Students and visitors.
Over the months since I have started
this project, it has taken many different directions and approaches. In the end,
we settled on designing the “rock hunters” as the first priority. Working closely
with their Education Manager and doing external research, I worked with the curriculum
and materials to include ties to the location’s iron forging history and how it
relates to erosion and rain runoff. As I began to research the site’s history,
and the originals Manor owner’s connection to iron milling, I found myself overcome
with information. There is contradictory information in some sources, as well
as local lore that I cannot find documentation to substantiate. Even with all
of this, the real struggle is how to relate the information in a 2-hour lesson
for elementary aged students.
