The Kids’ Archaeology Program (Fornleifaskóli barnanna)

The Kids' Archaeology Program, Iceland
Goals and activities

Sif Jóhannesdóttir
Unnsteinn Ingason

December 21th 2009
Contacts: sif@atthing.is
unnsteinn@farmhotel.is

Summary

The Kids Archaeology Program (Fornleifaskóli barnanna) is an educational and developmental project that started in 2007, based in Þingeyjarsýslur County in North East Iceland. The founders of the project are Litlulaugaskóli (local elementary school in North East Iceland) and Narfastaðir Guesthouse. The overall goal of the project is to connect different enterprises, institutions, and individuals in the region order to increase the public awareness of cultural remains and their relationship to modern and historic environment and land use practices. At the same time the program seeks to better connect different parts of the community in order to increase the understanding and knowledge of all those involved in the project of the value of cultural remains and pass on this heritage to future generations.

The project is based on a close long term cooperation between the local community and Icelandic and international archaeologists and environmental scientists who have been working in Þingeyjarsýslur since 1996 as part of the interdisciplinary Landscapes of Settlement project (now part of the International Polar Year (IPY) effort) and several US National Science Foundation Arctic Social Sciences sponsored Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) programs directed by Dr. Sophia Perdikaris. These scholars and their participating home institutions (including Archaeological Institute Iceland, U Iceland, Mývatn Research Station, City University of New York, U Colorado, Stirling Univ. Edinburgh Univ., U Durham, U. Leeds, U Bradford) have from the beginning provided the professional basis for the project, working in close cooperation with local educators, heritage institutions, and community organizations. All parties have worked productively together to create and refine a school program integrating hands-on learning, closely supervised student participation in scientific fieldwork, and classroom instruction that is now increasingly incorporating digital technology and map-based learning initiatives.

The Kids' Archaeology program in Þingeyjarsýslur is now participating in the international Islands of Change Project, funded by the US NSF and directed by Dr. Perdikaris that works to connect inner city New York students with students and teachers in Iceland and Barbuda in the West Indies. The Islands of Change project seeks to connect local communities (urban and rural) all affected by past and present global change through direct engagement in field science backed by class room instruction and aided by cutting edge digital technology to combine the efforts and expertise of local residents and international scientists in global change research while engaging and connecting young people in all these diverse communities. The experience of the Kids’ Archaeology program in Þingeyjarsýslur has been a key to the expanded Islands of Change effort, and lessons learned in NE Iceland are now being applied much more widely.

Many different activities by The Kids’ Archaeology program have been interlaced with the curriculum of Litlulaugaskóli. For the last two summers there has been a summer school, organized by The Kids’ Archaeology program. The summer school is meant for teenagers, and there they get the opportunity to expand their knowledge and experience and work in the field with archaeologists. The pupils that have been participating in the field activities of The Kids' Archaeology program have gotten insight to the world of archaeology and gotten training in scientific field methods by direct contact in small groups with instructors and fellow students who span the range from PhD and MA-level instructors to doctoral students to undergraduates closer to their own age. That is a gateway to the world of scientific work for those kids and they get a feeling for the work all those “specialists” (from study of pollen and insects to artifacts and environmental history) are doing when they visit each summer. They also practice many different skills through participating in the activities of the Kids’ Archaeology program, drawing conclusions from their own observations of the physical record of the natural heritage around them, while improving drafting, photography, and record keeping skills and practicing English while getting to know people from very different cultures- and discovering that science can be done by people just like themselves.

The activities and experiences of The Kids’ Archaeology program are going to be put into formal curriculum, educational material and guidelines for teachers. That will make it possible for other schools in cooperation with archaeologists to use the experience and development done in The Kids’ Archaeology program in Þingeyjarsýslur. Archaeological remains are all around and research is being done in very many places, and interest has already been expressed in developing similar programs in South Greenland, Faroes, and the Orkney Islands as well as in other parts of Iceland. So the opportunities for fruitful cooperation are numerous, and the program is only beginning to fulfil its potential.