Loud cries of “Hear, hear!” “Aye, aye!” and “Huzzah!” issued forth from Room 223 of Hildreth Elementary School Tuesday, June 5. Inside, Samuel Adams, Paul Revere, and Sarah Bradlee Fulton were urging the fourth-grade colonists to be outraged at the attempts of King George III of England to impose taxation without representation. Now, with the latest controls put on the sale of tea, things had come to a head. Adams, Revere, and Fulton asked the well-informed group which of them were loyalists and which patriots. Three representatives from each side stepped forward to declare themselves. The loyalists insisted the British laws were fair and they owed respect to the king; the patriots declared it was time to take action, to fight for their liberty, and to destroy the tea.
When the governor announced to the mob that the tea must be unloaded as the law demanded, he was met with loud boos and hisses and even some thumbed noses. The leaders, urging the crowd to “cast off this yoke of tyranny,” gave each patriot a large feather as a disguise and made them swear an oath that they would never speak of what happened this dark night. The young colonists began marching and chanting “Throw the tea/Into the sea.” Boarding three British ships, they proceeded to throw 340 crates of loose tea into Boston Harbor.
British Army General Thomas Gage (Brendan McMahon) pretends to eavesdrop on the plans of Samuel Adams (Stephen Chueka) and Sarah Bradley Fulton (Rachael MacAskill) as Colin White (pointing in center) and his fourth-grade classmates react during a reenactment of the Boston Tea Party, June 5, at Hildreth Elementary School. (Photo by Lisa Aciukewicz)
This was part of an interactive program put on by three actors from Boston Tea Party Ships & Museum; it was the fourth year a group from the museum has come to Harvard. According to fourth-grade teacher Joan Accorsi, the program was in jeopardy this year because the cost had increased and the Parent Teacher Organization didn’t see how it could fund it again and also support a science program. But the PTO was determined to find a way to do both, and its request for funding from the Harvard Schools Trust was granted, which made the program possible. Accorsi said the teachers were grateful to the PTO and the trust and for how “the community came together for the kids.” She said the Boston Tea Party Ships & Museum program is “one of the best to come through the school.” Fourth grade spends about six weeks studying the American Revolution, and this program adds a layer of engagement that really brings the history alive, Accorsi said.
Banter, slapstick, and history
There is no question that the Tea Party program was lively and engaging. The three actors were constantly in motion, providing historical information, bantering among themselves (even some slapstick by Revere), and interacting with two classes of fourth-graders at each of two performances. Each of the students had a card. On many of the cards was the name of a historical person and a bit of dialogue for the student to read aloud at the appropriate time. Some cards identified the holder as either a loyalist or a patriot and a specific reason for being so. Other students were called on to help move a “400-pound” tea crate; fast-walk back and forth along a measured rope to try to beat a ship’s 5-knot speed; or act out a scene in which a carpenter is hit on the head and presumed dead. Of course it was yelling “Huzzah!” with fist raised in agreement or thumbing a nose at the Redcoat messenger from the king that brought out 100 percent participation by the children.
The three actors were masterful at moving things along at a fast pace yet never hurrying any child engaged in the activity. They smoothly got participants to the front of the room and back to their seats on the floor. Whenever a new activity began, they made sure to recruit a student who had not yet participated.
The program engaged the students in different levels of thinking. Paul Revere sometimes appeared clueless so that Adams and Fulton could define terms such as “writ of assistance” or “smuggling.” Some of the activities required recall of a fact and others engaged kids in critical thinking—this dumping of tea: Was it peaceful protest or was this treason? Why did the act have consequences for Boston and how did it lead to war?
Along with imparting a lot of information, the program reinforced a number of social skills. Students got practice speaking in front of a large number of people. Some of the activities required working in groups, and students were put into three teams: Dartmouth, Eleanor, and Beaver, named after the three British ships. They were reminded a number of times to collaborate to come up with an answer.
Tea bag toss
The program was very well planned, moving from a high level of physical activity to a calmer, listening-thinking activity. After role-playing the buildup of grievances and the Tea Party itself, students formed teams and competed in a “tea bag toss,” where targets on a board represented different qualities of tea and were therefore worth different numbers of points. (But neither the students nor the actors were overly concerned about who had more points.) Then students had to listen carefully to two different stories and, as a team, answer 10 questions at the end of each. The first story involved more historical details of the dumping of the tea—the dark, frigid night; the low tide that required stomping the tea crates into the mud; the man who tried to stuff his pockets full of tea. The second story was about a sailor’s life aboard an 18th-century sailing vessel, complete with practice furling a sail and tying a square knot.
Accorsi said she is already looking forward to the return of the Tea Party next year.
