Real Archaeology at Schugtown Mounds (3GE2) by 5th Graders from Greene County Tech and Friends

By Dr. Julie Morrow

Ms. Bonnie Robb brought seventy-five fifth graders from Greene County Tech to visit the Arkansas Archaeological Research Station at ASU on May 4, 1999. That morning, I talked with them about archaeology, emphasizing the importance of retaining and preserving information from archaeological sites. At 11:00 Am we departed for the site of 3GE2, Schugtown Mounds, to conduct a controlled surface collection (Figure 1).

Assisting me in this project were Arkansas Archaeological Society members Michelle Kettler and Robert Taylor. The conditions were ideal for this activity and the farmer who granted permission for us to be there happened to be at the site when we arrived. There were no seeds yet planted, but the ground had been row tilled and rainwashed (Figure 3). The field had probably already been picked over by artifact collectors but the students learned in general about materials found on archaeological sites in Northeast Arkansas (Figure 4).

The students partnered up and each two-partner team was assigned a row to walk down. Each team had a transect about 10 meters wide (about 8 to 10 rows). They were each given a bag and were instructed to pick up everything they saw in their transect except for modern plant materials like pieces of wood or straw, and put them in their bag. We started at the western edge of the field (Figure 5). It took a while for them to get to their destination, just a few hundred meters to the the east at the edge of the plowed field. Most of the material collected in one transect was contained in a gallon size ziplock bag; some required two bags (Figure 6). The students were thrilled to participate in this controlled surface collection, but were even more excited about climbing onto the top of one of the two heavily vegetated mounds that are still in existence at the site. I asked them to imagine what they thought the site may have looked like before it was a modern farm. All of the students wrote thank you letters and I selected a few of them for this page (Figure 7).

The archaeology experience took about half a day. I offered the opportunity for the students to return to the ASU laboratory to process their collection. To volunteer in the laboratory please e-mail me at jmorrow@astate.edu

It's a great day for archaeology.

UNDER CONSTRUCTION

-PHOTOS TO BE ADDED-

This website is maintained by Dr. Julie Morrow, jmorrow@astate.edu 

This page was last updated on August 10, 2005