All of the activities in the studio were engaging, but the most affecting for many of us were the human organs. I agree with other cohort members who said that it felt significant to hold and examine a brain that had actually come from a person.
Real physical artifacts are so powerful for kids, too, and we should seek them out for our students whenever we can. A few years ago, I hoped my students would be interested in a diary from an Oregon Trail emigrant that I borrowed from a friend, so it was really nice to see their amazement and respect for it. The context really helped; we had been working for a few weeks with photos and diary excerpts, which brought the subject down to a more personal level. Anecdotes from diaries on historical websites gave the students a relatable view of daily life and the attitudes and feelings of individual emigrants.
When I brought in the diary written by a man named Dan, we looked at the cover first, which was understandably very beaten up. Then when I opened it up, they could see the beautiful script that some people of that era wrote. The students all gasped. It was a wonderful moment, because as we went through the residency, we could almost always refer back to Dan. The kids felt a connection to him because we had the book that he had carried on the trail, and even though he must have been exhausted at the end of each day of traveling, he wrote in it most days.
When we looked at the human hearts in the studio, there was a personal connection for me. My dad has been dealing with congestive heart failure for quite some time, and one of the hearts we looked at had that same medical issue. I don't understand why, but I didn't feel the slightest bit upset looking at it. My thoughts were more along the lines of understanding better how hard the body can work to adapt itself to its conditions, and how strong human bodies are. I think that, despite my dad having had five heart attacks and three open-heart surgeries, among endless other things, he must be a really tough guy to have withstood all of that, and to have retained his quality of life for the most part.
After his second bi-pass, his surgeon came out and explained to us how it went. It was a pretty rough operation, as there was so much scarring from the previous surgery. He said, "to clear away some of the scar tissue, I lifted his heart..." and he showed with his hands how he had lifted my dad's heart up. We could not stop staring at his hands after that. He had held my dad's heart in his hands!
If we give kids opportunities like the one we had in the studio to learn in such an engaging way, they will probably remember some of those experiences for their whole lives.
