About Us

We are a group fifth graders from Spring Hill Elementary School in Spring Hill, Kansas. We got involved in this web project when our teacher, Mrs. Vopat and our technology facilitator, Mrs. Jones, asked us if we would be interested in doing a technology project about World War II or the 1940s era in association with the Eisenhower Museum. The first thing we got to do was to take a field trip to the Eisenhower Museum in Abilene, Kansas. The museum trip gave us a place to start and some ideas on what topics to pick for our project. The only guidelines were that our website had to have something to do with the 1940s or 1950s, when Dwight Eisenhower was most popular, and that we should be trying to document and preserve personal accounts and local history on our topic. We brainstormed some topics and also a name for our group. We decided to call ourselves the Jr. IKES (Interested Kids Exploring SocialStudies). Since our district high school had already started a World War II site to document oral histories of the lives of servicemen and their wives. We thought we might build off of that idea. Since we were "kids" we thought it would be interesting to see what World War II and that time period was like through the eyes of children ages eight to 18. Each of us picked a broad topic that we were interested in such as Military, Toys, Fashion, Entertainment, etc. We came up with a list of appropriate questions that would help us gain knowledge on our chosen topics. We then started interviewing, taping, and e-mailing adults who would have been children during the war. It was fun doing personal interviews and waiting for answers or letters to come in. We took several field trips to Ft. Riley, Artillery Hill, Kansas State University, Paola Museum, Combat Air Museum, Spring Hill Historical Society, and the Daniel's Story Exhibition. We learned how to tape interviews, use digital cameras, digitize audio tapes and create a web page. The result is our website, Kids' View of World War II and the 1940s Era. We hope you enjoy reading, listening, and seeing memorabilia from our research.
We would like to thank the many people who were willing to share their stories, letters, and memorabilia with us. We would also like to thank all of the staff of Spring Hill Elementary School and USD 230 for supporting us. Without them, this site would not have been possible. Thank you again.

Jr. Ikes Teams

          Producing Instructional Change Through Technology is a project supported by a grant awarded by the Kansas Department of Education through the Educate America Act program. The program is a partnership between Kansas State University, Emporia State University, The Eisenhower Presidential Library, Paola USD #368, Gardner-Edgerton USD #231, Blue Valley USD #229, Santa Fe Trail, USD #434, and Spring Hill USD #230.
          The description and goals of this project are described below in a quote from Dr. Dan Lumley.
          "Specifically, the project is aimed at changing the teaching process and promoting the upgrading of teachers' knowledge of core content areas (social studies, science, language arts, and mathematics) in the consortium districts. The ultimate goal is to change the instructional pattern in consortium districts from one in which the teacher delivers the information to passive students to one in which students actively discover learning for themselves.
          The project stresses the importance of showing teachers how their students can preserve historical community-based resources (oral histories, letters, pictures, diaries, etc) and share their preservation efforts with the world on the World Wide Web. The major anticipated change is that teachers will, upon completion of project training, start using new, powerful, motivational, and exciting technology-related instructional strategies in their classrooms."
           The students found this "hands-on" project an exciting and motivating way to learn.

Mrs. Vopat and Mrs. Jones