Students visit court

“How much money do you make?” “How did you get this job?” and “Do you have to put up with a lot?” are not questions Justice of the Peace Wanda James is used to answering at the Mineral County Courthouse, but Thursday she was subjected to a panel of tough questions from Dianna Campbell’s second grade class from Superior Elementary.

“They were great to have in here,” James said.

The class toured the Mineral County Courthouse and met with James to ask her questions about what she does on a daily basis. Campbell said that they all came up with their own questions that they had written down before they got to the courthouse.

Then the students took a tour of the jailhouse and got to see what the inside of a jail looks like.

“Wanda did a good job getting them ready for the jail house,” Campbell said. “I don’t think they were scared but one student did say ‘Are there any bad guys in here?’”

The students also got to talk with an ambulance driver and a dispatcher. Then they took a tour of the courthouse and spoke with Mineral County Attorney Shaun Donovan.

“I think a lot of the classes here at the Superior try to make field trips that are relevant to what they are learning,” Campbell said.

Campbell’s class is working with a unit about community workers and their importance in the community.

“We talk about what’s in our community and the people that are in our community and how everything’s important and how we’re a part of that community,” Campbell said.

Campbell said that the trip was very convenient and the opportunity for her class of 22 students to simply stroll down to the courthouse and learn about how things work was very useful.

“This is a reinforcement of what we’re learning and a chance to apply what they’ve learned also,” Campbell said.

As part of the unit the students will also have visiting speakers come into their class room. Campbell said that a local baker will be visiting with them and teaching them how to decorate cookies and a firefighter will visit and talk about his job.

The class will also watch a video about what it is like to be an architect and then they will build marshmallow and toothpick houses.

Campbell said that hands-on activities like the tour and the speakers that her class is experiencing are really effective and the students learn a lot from it.

“It makes learning more exciting and I think they remember it more to. They can feel the connection between a book and what’s really out there,” Campbell said.

At the end of the unit Campbell said that the class will be reading a book called When I’m Big and then writing about what they want to be when they grow up. She said that she is going to try to find uniforms for the children to wear that fit their aspirations for the classes final activity in the unit.