Gold Fever is a great way to kick off your school year. Often at the beginning of the year, teachers are setting up their classrooms and getting students comfortable in their new community. Well that is exactly what this program is all about! How to set-up a community so everyone gets along and works together to accomplish a goal.
Gold Fever sets students in the time period of the Yukon/ Klondike Goldrush, in which people from all over the world traveled to Alaska to find their fortune in Gold. As a result, diverse communities began to form and they had to have some way to work out disagreements. Thus arise the Miner's Meeting. Miner's Meetings were usually called by a miner that had a disagreement or issue with another person in the community. During the meeting both miners were given a chance to make statements and the rest of the persons in the meeting were able to ask questions and then pass a judgement.
During Gold Fever, students will travel with a miner and his pack dogs to a mining camp in order to simulate a Miner's Meeting to determine if the miner has legally jumped a claim or illegally jumped a claim based on facts provided.
Students will use basic logic and algebra skills to examine the gold claim and provide a judging, only after they have worked together with other classes to agree on "rules" or a "code" to judge by. Following the program, students and teachers are encouraged to create their own classroom community codes and share them in our online Social network, as well as processes for resolving conflicts in the classroom.
Students will get a nice math refresher, as well as a fun way to help set-up their classroom community.
