Retired educator and author Terry Lee Marzsell, who recently visited the International Spy Museum in Washington, DC, encourages teachers and students to explore the museum’s resources.  Photo credit: Terry Lee Marzell.

As a retired teacher, I know that educators who are still working in the classroom enjoy leading their students to a variety of academic activities. Field trips, virtual tours, and academic websites are among the most fascinating educational activities we can share. Recently I traveled to Washington, DC, where I was able to participate in an exploration of the International Spy Museum. I was there side-by-side with a number of groups of school students who were excited to be able to spend the day at this unique museum.

If you, like many educators, are unable to escort your students to the museum, you can still explore the exhibits through online resources at this link: Spy Museum. On the museum website, students can see information about code breaking, sabotage, spying that shaped history, interrogation, and surveillance. For an overview of notorious spies and spymasters throughout time and to learn about tools used to carry out spy missions, your students can click on this link to Stealing Secrets. They can view resources related to covert action, sabotage, secret soldiers, and propaganda at this link: Covert Action.

If you and your students are able to visit in person, you will find the museum at 700 L’Enfant Plaza, SW in Washington, DC. The museum is open from 9:00 am to 7:00 pm every day. The cost is $24.95 for adults and students over age 12. While there, maybe your students would like to opt for a fictional cover identity and engage in activities that would test their spy sills on a fictional undercover mission. There’s also a fun museum shop with a plethora of novelty items and clothing items for sale. Enjoy!

A tour of the United States Supreme Court building located in Washington, DC, would make an excellent experiential learning experience for students.

Most educators agree that travel is one of the best methods of experiential learning. And one of the most rewarding destinations for travel for American students is our nation’s capital city, Washington, DC. There are many historic sites to visit in the city, and one of the most impressive is the United States Supreme Court building. This building is the work place of the United States Supreme Court, the highest and most influential court in the nation.

Originally the Supreme Court justices met in a small side chamber in the US Capitol building. By the turn of the 20th century, however, the court had outgrown the space. In 1912, Chief Justice William Howard Taft began advocating for a separate structure to house the justices. Shortly thereafter, architect Cass Gilbert designed a new Supreme Court building in the neoclassical style. Construction began in 1932 and was completed in 1935.

A visit to this impressive building would make an excellent experiential learning experience for students. While there, they can view the actual courtroom where the Supreme Court justices meet. If they time it right, they can even listen to a short lecture conducted by one of the docents. The docent will present interesting information about how the court works. In addition to the Courtroom, portions of the first and ground floors of the building are open to the public. Be sure your students see the John Marshall statue and the numerous portraits and busts of former justices which decorate the hallways.

Your class can learn more about the US Supreme Court at this website: Supreme Court. You can also view this brief 3-minute YouTube video for an overview of the building  (please ignore the commercial at the end).

As always, I urge you to teach a great day!

The author’s husband, Hal Marzell, at the United States Memorial Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC.

Many teachers include Holocaust education is a part of their educational curriculum. There are many ways to incorporate lessons about the Holocaust into a lesson plan, but one of the best would be a visit to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum located in Washington, DC.

My husband and I recently spent an entire day exploring this extensive museum. The institution holds a collection of more than 12,750 artifacts; 49 million pages of archival documents; 85,000 historical photographs; a list of over 200,000 registered survivors and their families; 1,000 hours of archival footage; 93,000 library items; and 9,000 oral history testimonies.

When your students enter the permanent exhibit, they will be given an identification card which tells the story of a random victim or survivor of the Holocaust. When they exit the elevators on the fourth floor, they will walk through a chronological depiction of the history of the Holocaust. The depiction starts with the Nazi rise to power led by Adolf Hitler, and additional exhibits explore the topics of Aryan ideology, Kristallnacht, Anti-Semitism, and the American response to Nazi Germany. More exhibits explore Jewish ghettos, the Final Solution, and the liberation of the concentration camps, among other topics. The exhibits conclude with videotaped survivor testimony.

One of the most moving places in the museum,in my opinion, is the Hall of Remembrance. This hall is the USHMM’s official memorial to the victims and survivors of the Holocaust. Here visitors can memorialize the event by lighting a candle, visiting an eternal flame, and reflecting in silence in the brightly lit hexagon-shaped space.

To regulate the number of visitors occupying the space at one time, it is recommended that visitors obtain admission tickets in advance. Tickets are distributed outside the museum beginning at 9:45 am for visits at specified times throughout the day. The museum is open every day except Yom Kippur and Christmas Day. Admission is free.

To learn more about this museum, you and you students can click on the link USHMM.