３月４日(水）
花子ちゃんの学校の５年生は、今学期に入ってずっとsocial studiesのプロジェクトとして、「移民」について取り組んでいます。クラス担任に絶対的権限が与えられているので、取り組み方はクラスによって様々です。花子ちゃんのクラスでは、各生徒がそれぞれ自分が取り組む移民グループを選び（アイルランド系、ドイツ系、日系、ロシア系などなど）、この３か月、それについての本を読んだり、インタビューしたり、ウェブを活用したりして、何故移民が祖国を離れなければいけなかったのか、当時に祖国の状況はどんなだったか、移民船での様子、アメリカでの生活、仕事、人生などについてリサーチをすすめ、最後にエッセーをまとめる、という活動を続けてきました。多くの子供が祖先の移民グループを選びましたが、中には全く関係のないグループを選ぶ子供もいました。花子ちゃんは愛国者ですから当然日系移民ですが、日本人のお子さんの中にはアイルランド系やロシア系（どちらもscamamには面白そうなのですが）を選ぶ子供もいて、色々です。
花子ちゃんの担任の先生は祖国の社会状況についてとてもこだわって調べさせてくれたので、花子ちゃんは休日など時間がある時にscamamとのんびり進めて家康まで来た日本史を慌ててスキップして江戸時代末期まで持っていき、明治維新、文明開化、富国強兵、更には太平洋戦争まで、細かいことは抜きにして、時代の流れを大急ぎでフォローすることになりました。そうしないと、日系移民が何故太平洋を渡ったのか、何故排日運動が生じたのか、そして何故強制収容所に入れられたのか、の説明がつかないからです。大変ではありましたが、こんな風に歴史を勉強できるアメリカの子どもたちは幸せだなぁ、と思いました。更に、この先生は、同時進行的に１９世紀後半の産業革命についての授業も進めて、移民たちがアメリカの資本社会にどのようにinvolveされていったかまで、子供たちの思考を持っていこうとして、さすがジャーナリスト養成に意欲を燃やし続けて何十年のベテランだと、感じ入りました。
５年生は他に２クラスあるのですが、そのうち１クラスの情報はよく入ってくるので、そこではどのようにこのプロジェクトが進められたかも、面白い比較材料です。そのクラスでは、自分の先祖の出身国の旗を描いて廊下に張り出し、移民船での生活についてなりきり日記を書いて、最後は当時の移民たちの服装（に近いもの）を着てパーティをする、というものだったそうです。このクラスの先生は、数年前まで１年生を教えていた、ということなので、さもありなん、といった感じです。
但し、花子ちゃんの担任の先生は、相変わらずsocial studiesにのめりこんで理科を疎かにする傾向があり、２学期に理科でやると言っていた電流とマシーンのうち、電流はかろうじて終わりましたがマシーンは先送りになった模様です。先のクラスでは、マシーンの原理の理解を助ける簡単な工作をしてきた、というので、やはり理科でもクラスによってバラツキがあります。
こんな風ですから、カリフォルニアでもそうでしたが、新学年が始まる前には親が先生を選ぶチャンスがあります。花子ちゃんの学年の一番人気はここに出てこなかったクラスの先生、花子ちゃんの担任の先生は生徒の好き嫌いがはっきりしているという評判で２位に甘んじ、移民パーティの先生が３位という結果だったそうです。一番人気の先生のところには、はっきり主張するアメリカ人が集中して日本人は一人だけ。それで情報が入りにくいのですが、この先生が産休に入ってしまって、若い代用教員に代わってしまい、クラスが大騒ぎになっているというから、皮肉です。我が家はここに来た時にはクラスがかってに決められていましたから、ラッキーでした。こんな緊張感、日本の先生たちは耐えられますかね～。
花子ちゃんの先生は理科を疎んじますが、ＰＣやインターネットは駆使します。ある日突然２５台のノート・パソコンがクラスに運び込まれ、エッセーはwordで打ち始めました。多分powerpointだと思いますが、プレゼン用資料の試作もさせているようです。更に、wikispacesというスペース共有サイトを利用して、インタビューの内容をクラスメートとシェアさせたりもしています。これが、また、小説よりも奇、なので少しupしておきます。
My Grandpa George
Reading about someone's grandparent's is nowhere near fun, but just humor me and my family and read the dang story.
My grandpa George was born in a very Jewish part of Austria-Hungray called Galencia in a little village, which is now part of Poland.
He left Galencia at the age of 13 or 14 because he got in an argument argument with the vlliage rabbi, and after the argument the rabbi implied that grandpa Geroge had to leave.So he packed his bags and since he was very adventrourous he decided to go to the USA. No one knows why but he went alone. When he got here he went through Ellis island and past it on his first try. After Ellis Island he moved to where most immigrants moved at that time, The Lower East Side. It's unknown who he stayed with but we do know he found a job immidiatley. He worked as a fruit cart vendor, the job description is he'd go to the owner, the owner would give him the cart and the fruit he'd go sell that fruit for the day, and then he'd make a small cut out of all the money got from selling the fruit.The owner got the rest. The other two big things that happened in the Lower East Side to Grandpa George are...he changed to working in a garment factory, where he worked long hours and was paid little, also he got married to a girl named Sadie from Russia, who left because of anti senitisim.
Then Grandpa George moved to Lorraine ,Ohio with his wife where he was closer to his brother and had all four kids. Fanny, Jack or Jerome, Selma, and my grandpa Melvin. In Lorraine, my great grand father opened up a bakery called Lerner's bakery.he bought it around the Great Depression, so his family never suffered from hunger, none the less starvation. The people who imigrated to the USA from Europe who'd lived near Galencia were Grandpa Geroge's employees. The cooks would come in about 3 in the morning and would leave at noon. The salespeople would come in around 6 o clock, and leave later in the day. 20 years after he'd opened the bakery, he sold it and bought a bar. Lorraine was a steel mining town, so the bar was near the steel mine. Grandpa George's daughter Fanny's husband Milt also worked at that bar.Fifty years after moving into a a house in Lorraine,Ohio, Grandpa George retired in Miami Beach, where he died at the age of 82. The most valuable things he brought to the United States of America were his sense of adventure and his sense of humor.
My great great grandma (Margarita Revelini) immigrated from a small town in Italy called Benevento. She came over with her father when she was fourteen in 1906 traveling in steerage class. Three years earlier, her mother ran off with another man to Argentina, leaving her husband and children behind. Her brother left for America two years before she came over with her father to see if it would be good for the rest of them to come. Margarita came from a family of farmers with modest means. When she first got to America she lived in the Italian section of the Bronx, and she made a living by cleaning the wealthier people's houses. Three years later, she married Guiseppe Capasso, a man they knew from their village back in Italy. He was 17 years older than her but it was common back then for women to marry men who were older because it meant they had more years to work and save up to support a family. After Margarita and Guiseppe married, they moved to Mt .Vernon, NY and raised a family including my great grandmother Louise. When Louise was married and raising her children Margarita bought them a house in Scarsdale on Johnson Road and moved in with them. By that time, her first husband and her second husband had died. Everyone knew her then as "Grandma Lombardi". When my mom grew up in Scarsdale, she often went the house on Johnson Road where Grandma Lombardi still spoke in a "half-english/half-italian" language. Grandma Lombardi always wore black because she was widow. she had a big white apron on at all times and she kept her money tied up in a handkerchief tide to the apron. In another handkerchief tied to her apron she would keep figs! She said eating figs is what kept her living so long.
My Great Grandma Beatrice Andrewes (1878-1966)
My Great Grandma (Beatrice Andrewes) immigranted from London,England with her sister (Violet) and mother (Anna). On the boat ride over from England to America they rode in first class. So they got to dance,swim and had decent food to eat. Beatrice also had a boyfriend on the boat. They did not get processed through Ellis Island they were processed on the boat. They arrived in America in 1897 for better jobs and a new life. Also,they came because Anna (Beatrice's) wanted to move away from her husband who she recently divorced. Anna was a dressmaker in Rochester, NY after her arrival in the United States.
