As part of their history curriculum, seventh graders will hold the 5th annual World Market event in the Ground Zero Quad, April 28. Participants will recreate a 13th-century environment with booths, food, costumes and props.
The occasion will run from about 8:30 a.m. to 1:20 p.m. Throughout the day, various elementary classes will visit World Market in order to purchase items and interact with assorted booths. With an invitation, high school students are allowed to visit the function between 12:40 and 1:20.
Each booth represents a country from the era. The display covers different places such as Constantinople, the Spice Islands, Egypt and Italy.
Before the World Market, students focused on the medieval era, hence the former name “Medieval Market.”
History teacher Natalie Douty appreciates the wide range of information incorporated in the World Market presentation.
“It is a culmination of all of the regions they [seventh graders] have studied over the past year in World History and synthesized into a grand event,” Douty said, “all the way from booth design to products for sale to the costumes and banners.”
Students began working on their projects in January. The annual assignment requires them to build a booth, make and purchase items to sell, come up with a costume and create a flag that represents their country.
While some students dislike the assignment, seventh grader Olivia Quebe looks forward to the event.
“It takes a lot of work,” Quebe said. “I like it because we learn so much from doing this. I am really excited to finally sell all our items. My group had Egypt, and we all worked good [sic] together in order to get a lot done.”
Through the sale of goods at each booth, students have the opportunity to make money. Each ticket, purchased for cash at the start of World Market, is valued at 10 cents. In previous years, student revenues have ranged from $30 to $100.
Eighth grader Daniel Frea remembers engaging in the World Market last year. His team, which represented Arabia, made the most money.
“I liked it because we didn’t have any other schoolwork besides World Market,” Frea said. “I learned that there is a lot more to a country than you think — for example, Arabia isn’t just deserts. I enjoyed making a lot of money because it showed that other students liked our booth best.”
In addition to learning about history, the seventh graders gain experience in business practice and management, Douty said.
“Students also learn business practices such as supply and demand, pricing, product placement and marketing their products to shoppers,” Douty said. “They learn time management on how to prepare for a big project, not to mention how to work cooperatively within a group, plan and delegate tasks. Hopefully, students learn to compromise, cooperate, support and mesh various ideas with groups so their project is successful.”
For past coverage of World Market, read the April 21, 2010 article, World Market to recreate history.
Madeleine Yee • Sep 7, 2011 at 12:02 am
This picture perfectly describes how I feel about track people…beasts.
Go track!