Practice, Practice, Practice! Teachers Attend AmeriTowne Teacher Trainings
With Young AmeriTowne of Kansas attendance days quickly approaching, we sat down with teachers from 21 schools to go over their curriculum for the Spring semester.
On January 24th and 26th, Jacque and Sabre hosted over 40 teachers from 21 schools for our AmeriTowne Teacher Trainings. These trainings go through the curriculum used in the classroom before students come to Lenora and fill their roles at Young AmeriTowne of Kansas.
About the Trainings
While attending the Teacher Training, we give tips and tricks to new teachers with help from a previous educator, Kathy Hofstetter, who taught the AmeriTowne curriculum for 10 years. Kathy is now one of Nex-Gen’s AmeriTowne Assistants who works with students in the Bank on attendance days. For our returning teachers, we give updates on our new curriculum (such as our Entrepreneurship lesson and Digital Media Agency) and share any new tips we may have learned from their previous attendance days. Each piece of curriculum is utilized by the students in one way or another when they attend. Writing checks, budgeting, entrepreneurship, and philanthropy are just a few of the pieces students are taught before attending AmeriTowne.
Speaking of New...
This year at Young AmeriTowne of Kansas, we have added to the curriculum an Entrepreneurship piece. This addition is based on one of Nex-Gen's older programs, Nex-Great Idea, which was created by Jacque, and a former-employee-now-board-member-of-Nex-Gen, Mendi Anschutz. During the summer, Nex-Gen's intern, Jaelyn Rumback, used this original program and the AmeriTowne curriculum to create and collaborate on what is now our Lesson 15: Entrepreneurship. In this lesson, students assess themselves on their entrepreneurship skills and learn the seven steps to a basic business plan.
Jaelyn also worked to update our room from the Newspaper Shop to the new Nex-Great Idea Shop. After removing the old newspaper wallpaper, she painted the word "Create". The Nex-Great Idea Shop is a creative addition to our AmeriTowne. This shop houses a space for students to use their creativity and artistic skills to create and sell products, such as personalized bracelets and fabric pencil bags, to their peers during their attendance day.
Another new shop that we added this year is the Digital Media Agency. This shop brings together our previously-known Newspaper Shop and Sign & Print Shop. During their day, the Digital Media Content Creators interview other students and create stories to share on their Digital News Feed. After their day at Towne, each school receives their News Feed to share with their students and to keep as a memento of their field trip.
Thank You Teachers!
Each teacher devotes their time in their classrooms to prepare the students for this fun-filled field trip. We appreciate the hard work teachers invest in their students to help them be successful at not only AmeriTowne, but in life as well. We are incredibly grateful for each teacher who attended our Teacher Trainings and are looking forward to hosting them all this Spring at Young AmeriTowne of Kansas!
To learn more about Young AmeriTowne of Kansas, check out our website under the "Programs" tab, or contact our Youth Programs/AmeriTowne Coordinator Sabre Riggins at sriggins@nex-generation.org.
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