Students and Learning – Page 3

January 12, 2024

Dominique Toya

Contributed by Ryan J. Wheeler

I’ve sat down several times to write this. It’s hard, for a couple of reasons. Dominique will always remain a remarkable person, funny, talented, generous of spirit, and with a laugh that made everyone around her soar. I think I’ve delayed writing because I feared I wouldn’t find the right words. Also, I was afraid that with the words would come a finality.

Dominique demonstrates the addition of mica to a student’s piece, May 2016.

Last month saw the passing of a truly remarkable individual. We remain shocked and saddened by the loss of Dominique Toya (1971-2023), who we have been fortunate to know since 2013. Dominique was a fifth generation potter, born to the Corn Clan at the Pueblo of Jemez. Dominique’s particular style of pottery saw the fusion of traditional methods and materials with innovative shapes and surface treatments. Collaboration with her family and other artists produced stunning and innovative results.

Dominique shares points out the polished details on her mom’s town crier figure to Phillips Academy ceramics instructor Thayer Zaeder, May 2014.

Dominique and her mom Maxine and sister Mia, often with other friends and family, traveled to Andover every year since 2014 to share Pueblo pottery making with Phillips Academy students, faculty, and friends. These weeklong workshops allowed students to make their own ceramic pieces with clay from New Mexico, finished, decorated, guided, and encouraged by the Toya Family. One year I conducted interviews with students following the finale of the class—an open-air firing. Considering all that Phillips Academy has to offer, I was a bit surprised when many of the students said their time with Dominique and her family was their best Andover experience. I shouldn’t have been surprised. Dominique was far more than a gifted artist; she was an ambassador of Indigenous art, and above all, a generous teacher.

Dominique tends the open air pottery firing at the end of May 2022’s weeklong workshop as students look on.

I cherish the Toya Family’s time on campus, Dominique’s laughter and sense of humor, but also watching her help students design and complete pieces, often helping them figure out how to solve problems or challenges (often ones that they had created!). Dominique played a big role in many communities–she was involved in the Southwestern Association for Indian Arts, from exhibiting and frequently winning awards at the annual Santa Fe Indian Market, judging and mentoring, to service on the SWAIA board. Dominique also was a drag performer and frequently traveled to participate in the International Court System, including the Imperial Sovereign Court of New Mexico, where she was crowned Empress 10. The International Court System is a venerable and well-known LGBTQ organization, raising funds for social issues, education, and other charitable causes. Dominique and her mom often donated their pieces for those fundraising efforts. During the Jemez and Pecos feast days, Dominique and her family prepared traditional foods, like Jemez enchiladas and oven bread, welcoming friends and visitors into their home to celebrate.

Dominique shares some tips on finishing a piece with an Academy student, May 2023.

I’m grateful that Dominique chose to be part of the Peabody Institute and Phillips Academy communities as well. Dominique, you taught us all a lot about art, Indigenous art, clay, the magic of mica, the business (and politics) of Native American art, but most of all, the art of being yourself. I’ll end with some of the student reflections from the Toya Family workshop in 2017: “Working with the Pueblo potters is really fun—we learned a lot and they have an amazing sense of humor.” “To be able to incorporate these techniques into my pieces gave me a new level of respect for pottery.” “This is one of the best things I’ve done all term, actually all year.” “These artists are so cool and they really care about their art and about your art.” Dominique, thank you for sharing and Godspeed.

The Peabody Institute is fortunate to have several of Dominique’s pieces, including these two swirl vessels that were featured in the spring 2023 show “Women in Abstraction” at the Addison Galley of American Art.

If you’d like to learn a little more about Dominique, this is a great article from New Mexico Magazine: https://www.newmexicomagazine.org/blog/post/dominique-toya/

November 30, 2023November 30, 2023

Beyond Work Duty

Contributed by Peabody Student Volunteer, Anthony Chung Yin Woo

In the fall term of tenth grade, I first joined the Peabody as a work duty student before returning as a student volunteer during my upper senior year. Working at the Peabody has given me an in depth behind the scenes look into running a museum, exposing me to the challenges in caring for a collection. When participating in preparation works for the building renovation project last winter, I learned about some of the technical complexities that museum workers have to go through in order to responsibly safeguard the collection. Having had the great opportunity to attend the Peabody Board of Advisors meeting in the fall as a student representative, I was also exposed to some of the administrative complexities behind museum work.

A complete revamp of the basement area meant that we had to come up with creative solutions when it came to temporarily rehousing the collection within museum premises. Armed with a tape measure and a rough floor plan, we navigated all protruding columns and bulky built in radiators in the southern first floor gallery to mark up the approximate location for a separated temporary storage space with individual climate monitoring, while maintaining the required three foot hallway for access to the fire exit located at the back of the building. Additionally, previously underutilized spaces had to be optimized to fit in more durable, weather resistant objects, allowing me to foray into the expansive attic as I removed sawhorses and large glass tubes from the basement.

In spite of the physically and mentally draining task of completely clearing out the basement, moments of excitement rewarded me throughout the process. Under the empty wooden bays, for example, I found tiny matchboxes from the 1940s, cool items which alluded to the museum’s own history. A Spencer Delineascope, manufactured by Bell and Howell found in the basement, spoke to the great advancements made in projection technology since the 1930s, as the bulky object was moved slowly up the stairs. Only when it was removed from the little room under the stairs to the basement was when I could truly appreciate the size of the museum’s safe and its obsolescence in a time when the entire collection was kept behind locked doors.

*Direction Booklet for the Peabody’s Delineascope*

Learning about the 3D printed replicas of the intricate molding on the gallery ceilings also made me appreciate the museum as a historically significant space itself, allowing me to understand that preserving the space’s spirit through attention to detail was crucial even as the building is physically altered to facilitate better learning in the future through greater accessibility.

Attending the Peabody Advisory Committee meeting allowed me to better contextualize my work as a volunteer as I watched experts across disciplines partake in the collaborative process of museum governance. It was especially interesting for me to hear about the cross-institutional connections brought by Hopi artist Ramson Lomatewama, and I was particularly happy to share my experience at the communal fused-glass making workshop, which was enthusiastically attended by both faculty members and students. Going through items on the agenda, such as the adoption of a new mission statement, as well as the advisory board’s renaming (form the Peabody Advisory Committee to Peabody Board of Advisors), while less captivating than the discussion on the Peabody’s educational program and future student engagement opportunities, were nevertheless just as relevant to the student experience. As I look forward to returning to the updated building on Main Street in the winter, both as a student volunteer and as a member of this year’s Human Origins cohort, I am constantly reminded of the care demonstrated by the Peabody’s staff as well as the Peabody Board of Advisors towards the collection, the museum, and the greater community as a whole, manifested in the meticulous attention to word choice in the advisory board’s mission statement drafting process.

*My fused glass piece before* kiln firing.

August 17, 2023

Here’s the Dirt on Andover Summer’s Dig This! 2023

Contributed by Mikala Hardie

This summer, 23 young archaeologists set out to investigate one of the first buildings constructed by Samuel Phillips Jr. after he founded Phillips Academy. During the first week of the Andover Summer program, the students of the Lower School’s Dig This course were introduced to the story of the Mansion House and the mysterious fire that destroyed it in 1887. According to primary accounts, the fire seemed to have started in two different places in the house. This account was made even more suspicious by sources that said the caretakers, Mr. and Mrs. Carter, had their bags packed the day of the fire and walked away with insurance money. With this interesting piece of information, the students were excited to uncover more clues about the Mansion House and the people who inhabited it. The students worked in groups of 3 to 4 at six excavation units. These units were spread across the site in areas that, using past excavation results and Ground Penetrating Radar maps, had a good chance of finding evidence of the Mansion House.

Figure 1. Commemorative Plaque of the Mansion House

The first day of excavations was met with enthusiasm, apprehension, and later exhaustion as the students realized how much work goes into opening a unit. Nonetheless, we persevered and by the end of the first week of excavations many groups had already finished Level 1. Some had even found glass and metal artifacts which, of course, created healthy competition between groups and motivated the students as they continued in the second week of excavations.

Figure 2. Two students working in Excavation Unit 1

During the second week, things got interesting. The students working in Excavation Unit 5 came across an 1802 “Draped Bust” Liberty penny which caused a ripple of excitement for both the students and the instructors. This coin gave an important terminus post quem (TPQ) for the level and showed the students how old the artifacts we were finding really were.

Additionally, in Excavation Unit 2 Level 2, a brick feature began to reveal itself in the northeast corner. This unit was placed near a 2018 excavation unit that uncovered part of a chimney, so it is likely these features were related and Unit 2 uncovered another part of the chimney which helps in understanding how large the chimneys would have been and the layout of the Mansion House. The images below show the brick feature when it began to be discovered in Level 2 and the brick feature in Level 3 before backfilling.

Figure 3. Brick feature in Excavation Unit 2 Level 2

The third and final week of excavations supported the archaeological adage that you always find the most interesting stuff right before you’re going to leave a project. This week, two new features were discovered. One was in Excavation Unit 6, which was intended to find one of the foundational walls of the structure. This feature also included a brick, though it is unclear if it relates to another chimney of the house. There was also a large stone and some smaller stones found near it, though, likely not enough to constitute a foundational wall of the building.

Figure 5. Students working in Excavation Unit 6

That being said, one of the biggest finds of the project included a huge rectangular stone with other large stones overlapping it. This feature was found in Excavation Unit 1 which was placed north of Excavation Unit 2 in the hopes of uncovering part of the foundation of the house. Given the size of the stone and the overlapping rock around it, it is pretty likely that this feature relates to the foundation or a wall of the Mansion House. On the last day of excavations this unit surprised us further by containing a large amount of metal artifacts in the southwest corner of the unit. A fork, a hinge, a handle, and a plethora of other artifacts were uncovered in the last level of this unit. We probably could have found more in the next level if we didn’t have to backfill the next day. This unit is definitely one to revisit in future years!

Figure 6. Stone feature in Excavation Unit 1 Level 3.

While neither unit contained a feature, Excavation Unit 3 and Excavation Unit 4 contained a lot of charcoal and mortar. Excavation Unit 3 specifically had extremely dark, somewhat ashy soil which was likely due to the fire. Ideally future Dig This! classes will uncover more of this ashy, dark soil and the data can be compiled to give a better understanding of how the fire destroyed the mansion house.

During the last week of the course, the students were busy washing their artifacts and picking a few to display at their end of the year exhibition. These artifacts included a locking mechanism, large nails, blue transfer print ceramics, a marble, a hinge, and a fork! All of the artifacts found during this summer’s course were transferred to the Peabody Institute to be cataloged and analyzed with the rest of the Mansion House artifacts.

Figure 7. Fork found in Excavation Unit 1

Overall, the students had a great summer excavating the Mansion House and learning how to be archaeologists by following proper archaeological methods and recording techniques. I look forward to seeing what next summer’s Dig This class will find!

July 31, 2023July 31, 2023

New Acquisition: Three Generations

Contributed by Ryan Wheeler

The Peabody has several amazing pieces of pottery made by members of the Toya Family of Jemez Pueblo. On their first visit to the Peabody in 2013, Maxine and Dominique Toya noticed a small vessel on our open shelving. What caught their attention was a delicately painted corn stalk, representing their clan. They wondered aloud who might have used these design, and we were all delighted to find that Maxine’s mom and Dominique’s grandmother, Marie G. Romero, had made the piece. Marshall Cloyd ’58 generously helped us acquire several of Dominique’s creations, including a small seed jar with distinctive carved ribs and mica slip. Since then we have added a number of wonderful pieces to the Peabody collection, including one of Maxine’s owl figures and a collaboration featuring Dominque’s beautifully crafted vessel bearing Maxine’s hand painted deer and corn stalk designs.

In May, we acquired a special piece called Three Generations. Dominique said, “this was the last wedding vase my grandmother, the late Marie G. Romero, created before she passed away. My mom and I have kept it sitting at our studio until we finally decided to finish her. I’m going to sand her and apply mica on the top and bottom and mom will paint a design in the middle where the band is and paint the ears of corn. This piece will be called Three Generations and will be the only piece that is signed by me, my mom, and I’ll sign my grandmother’s name since she created her.” The Toyas fired Three Generations on April 3 and brought her to us during their workshop with students in May. This is a large piece, at least 11 inches tall, and the overall shape, finishing, and delicate painting is truly impressive. Dominique commented that, “my mom outdid herself again with the amazing painting!!!” and we couldn’t agree more!

April 10, 2023

Pueblo Revolt at ASECS

Contributed by Ryan Wheeler

At this year’s American Society for Eighteenth Century Studies (ASECS) conference, I had the opportunity to participate in the roundtable Teaching the Global Eighteenth Century. Phillips Academy instructor in history and social sciences Natalya Baldyga and I presented Assimilation, Acculturation, Catachresis, and Syncretism: Employing Archaeology to Foreground Indigenous Resistance in the Spanish Southwest, sharing our experiences teaching the Pueblo Revolt of 1680 to History 200 classes at the Academy.

Contemporary Indigenous artist Jason Garcia’s take on the Pueblo Revolt combines traditional materials and methods with graphic designs depicting Po’Pay, the architect of the revolt, as a comic book superhero. These two pieces are in the collection of the Robert S. Peabody Institute of Archaeology–you can see the vessel on the right in the inaugural exhibition of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Latino.

If you are not familiar with the Pueblo Revolt, it is a pivotal moment in the history of the Southwest and the modern descendants of those who fought Spanish colonization at the end of the seventeenth century. Our abstract has a little more information on the Revolt and our approach:

Using the case study of the Pueblo Revolt of 1680, our presentation illustrates how archaeological artifacts can be employed to unsettle and decenter colonial narratives by refocusing the North American story of the early eighteenth century on Indigenous peoples of the Spanish Southwest. Too often, Anglophone histories associate the long eighteenth century in the Americas with English colonialism in general, and with the American Revolution in particular. We ask students to consider instead the “first American Revolution,” in which the Pueblo Peoples, led by the Tewa religious leader Po’pay, confronted missionaries and soldiers in the Spanish borderlands of what is now New Mexico. In our classes, students explore both artifacts from the Pueblo Revolt and contemporary Puebloan artistic responses to the historical event, foregrounding Indigenous resistance and survival over tales of erasure and domination. This approach both reorientates students’ understanding of colonial North American history towards wider global narratives of European expansion, and, perhaps more importantly, introduces students to multiple ways that Indigenous peoples adapted to, resisted, and overcame the efforts to erase their cultural identities and physical existence.

Drs. Wheeler and Baldyga also celebrated their anniversary during the conference.

The Peabody Institute has long offered various versions of a Pueblo Revolt lesson, but the current iteration has greatly benefitted from Dr. Baldyga’s experience and training. Together we’ve developed the lesson, typically delivered in the world history survey course for tenth grade, providing students with anthropological concepts, like assimilation and catachresis, that they can use in other settings, as well as foregrounding contemporary Indigenous perspectives and objects directly related to the Revolt. Conversations with other participants in the workshop were productive, especially in their pedagogical approach to topics like the production of sugar.

August 11, 2022

Gearing Up for Human Origins

Contributed by Ryan Wheeler

The fall 2022 term at Phillips Academy is a little less than a month away and this time every summer my thoughts turn to Human Origins. Human Origins is the interdisciplinary science elective that I have been teaching since 2016 (the course originated with Jere Hagler and Peabody Institute staff in 2007).

Hands on activities are a mainstay of Human Origins, including work with our collection of fossil human casts and models, spear throwing, ancient paint making, fire making, and stone tool making. Many of these activities explore ancient human technologies and give students a glimpse into life in the Upper Paleolithic.

Human Origins student crafting a stone tool during fall 2020.

Stone tool making—or flint knapping—requires a little preparation each summer to make certain that we have the necessary safety gear, equipment, and raw stone for the students in the fall. In fall 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic when all courses moved online, we continued to flint knap in Human Origins by sending out kits with all the needed materials. This gave students a few weeks to familiarize themselves with the tools and techniques (after watching my safety video), rather than just one class period. Pedagogically this seemed like a good shift, so I’ve kept this as part of the course.

Knapping safety gear and tools for Human Origins.

I’ve also had a few colleagues ask about how I assemble the flint knapping kits. It is possible to find ready made kits online, these often don’t have the greatest materials, and lack safety gear like gloves, goggles, and leather pads. Here’s a list of some of the items that we typically put together in a Human Origins flint knapping kit:

Safety goggles
Leather gloves or cut proof gloves
A six-inch leather pad (helps protect legs and grip the flint spall)
An antler billet as a soft hammer
A river cobble as a hard hammer
A copper topped “bopper” for percussion flaking
A deer antler flaker (for pressure flaking)
A copper tipped flaker (for pressure flaking)
Large spalls of dacite and Georgetown flint (I’ve found these two materials work best for students—they knap uniformly, have few irregularities or inclusions, and can be readily obtained on online)

Dacite (left) and Georgetown flint spalls are good raw materials for beginners.

A variety of YouTube videos are available that introduce the techniques, which we also discuss in class. Students are encouraged to experiment with both percussion and pressure flaking, the different tools and materials, and making tools solo or in a group. As an instructor, I consider it a success if students are able to produce flakes (and name the different parts of a flake)!

Bifacial stone tools made by Human Origins students in fall 2020.

January 25, 2022

Reconnecting with old friends

Contributed by Marla Taylor

In late January, the Peabody Institute hosted a special school group visit of students at Cape Cod Academy. Why is this school group more special than any other? Well, it actually had a lot more to do with the teacher – Alex Hagler.

Alex has been a part of the Peabody’s extended family for nearly 13 years. They started as a volunteer in 2009 and have worked at the Peabody in several capacities: work duty student, volunteer, and temporary employee. Alex has been kind enough to contribute to the blog in the past and you can read their thoughts in a student reflection and retrospective submission from several years ago.

Now, Alex is a Latin teacher at Cape Cod Academy and introduces archaeology to their students as part of the curriculum. One of the best places for that, of course, is here at the Peabody Institute. Alex, and a co-teacher, brought six students to explore our TARPS mock excavation exercise and take a tour of the collections spaces. The students asked fabulous questions and learned important lessons about archaeology and Native American culture.

Welcoming Alex back as a teacher with their own students was a powerful “full circle” moment for us here. It is so rewarding to have an ongoing relationship with the students and alumni who connected with the Peabody while here at Phillips Academy.

If you are one of those students who enjoyed your time at the Peabody – reach out! We would love to connect with you again.

December 20, 2021

JAE’s Institutional Review Board Policy

Contributed by Ryan Wheeler

In August 2021, the Journal of Archaeology & Education’s editorial board met via Zoom to consider a policy regarding Institutional Review Board or IRB approvals for research published in the journal. The IRB originated with the passage of the National Research Act in 1974 after a series of congressional hearings on human-subjects research, but can trace its origins to research that lacked informed consent, like the Tuskegee Syphilis Study, which began in the 1930s.

The JAE board agreed that since studies involving assessment and other types of educational research would normally require at least a minimal review, we needed to have an explicit statement that alerted author’s to the need for IRB approvals prior to executing their studies. Shortly after the meeting the JAE policy website was amended to include the following guidance:

All human subjects research results published by the Journal of Archaeology and Education (JAE) must be approved by an Institutional Review Board (IRB) or an equivalent entity in the author’s country. The purpose of IRB review is to assure, both in advance and by periodic review, that appropriate steps are taken to protect the rights and welfare of people participating as subjects in your research. If you do not have an IRB affiliated with your organization, you must find a suitable IRB at a qualified university or other institution. Most universities have IRBs that will accept applications from outside their institution. Authors, especially those without an academic affiliation, could use an independent IRB, which is subject to the same federal regulations as universities. There may be fees associated with university and independent IRB reviews. The IRB protocol number assigned by your IRB must be included in the article. Manuscripts without IRB approval will not be considered for publication in JAE.

IRB policies at journals in medicine, psychology, and other fields that rely heavily on human-subjects research are usually brief. We felt, however, that the JAE policy needed to provide extra guidance as archaeologists expand their research to encompass educational studies on the effectiveness of teaching, assessment, work with students, and more. If you have questions about the JAE policy or how it might apply to your research, please contact the editors Jeanne Moe or Ryan Wheeler.

September 24, 2021

3D Printing and Human Origins

Contributed by Ryan Wheeler

The return to in-person classes means that this fall’s Human Origins includes many of the hands-on project-based assignments that have become a hallmark of the course.

Makerspace guru Claudia Wessner introduces Human Origins students to 3D printing.

Students in Human Origins—an interdisciplinary science elective—visited with Claudia Wessner, Oliver Wendell Holmes Library Makerspace guru—who introduced the class to our hominin 3D printing project, including different 3D printing technologies, some of the ways that archaeologists use 3D printing and scanning, and Virtual Reality (VR) technology. Ms. Wessner also showed students how to use the Makerspace 3D printers for their projects.

Each project team will select a fossil hominin to 3D print in the Makerspace. Hominins are humans and their close extinct ancestors, including fossils dating back about 6 to 7 million years ago. Students will present their scaled prints, along with basic info on the fossil, during class in a few weeks. This project was inspired by the inclusion of 3D scans of Homo naledi in Morphosource, a database of 3D scans of fossils and biological specimens hosted by Duke University. Since the Homo naledi scans were made available in 2015, many additional fossil scans have been added, including other hominins.

CT scan of a Neanderthal from Duke University’s Morphosource databank.

During our September 2021 visit to the Makerspace, Ms. Wessner introduced us to Nefertari: Journey to Eternity-A Tombscale VR Experience. VR technology uses a headset interface so users can experience a virtual world, in this case an Egyptian tomb that has been scanned and recreated. We also discussed The Dawn of Art, Google’s VR version of Chauvet Cave in France, featuring some of the world’s oldest cave paintings.

Human Origins students got to explore Nefertari’s tomb in VR or Virtual Reality.

To learn more about 3D scanning and printing in paleontology and archaeology take a look at the Virtual Curation Lab at Virginia Commonwealth University and University of South Florida’s Digital Heritage and Humanities Collection, each featuring different ways that 3D technology is used today.

Check back as we update this blog with the student 3D prints!

August 11, 2021

Back to normal… Sort of

Contributed by Marla Taylor

Like for so many of us, this summer has been a rather abrupt transition back to “normal” at the Peabody.

I returned to the office full time in July and had to hit the ground running to help support the other Peabody staff, welcome researchers, jump back into giving tours, and provide back up for Summer Session activities. It has definitely been a transition, but it feels good to have students, researchers, and volunteers back at the Peabody!

For the entire month of July, the Peabody hosted the Summer Session class Dig This! This Lower School initiative takes a closer look at different global case studies from across the ancient world to hone skills and understanding as a historian and archaeologist. Students then get to take part in excavating the lost Mansion House of Phillips Academy – the home of Samuel Phillips. It is always great to see these students get excited about archaeology every summer!

Dig This! students and faculty hard at work

Beyond that, it was a joy to welcome our Cordell Fellows for 2021 – Dr. Arthur Anderson and Dr. Gabe Hrynick. Their research is on the Peabody’s Northeast Archaeological Survey conducted partially in Down East, Maine in the late 1940s. I won’t try to summarize their work here, but will instead refer you to a blog they contributed a couple years ago. Their work in July focused on fully documenting one site, Thompson’s Point. A real plus to hosting researchers is that they do some of the collections documentation work for me – I am looking forward to receiving a copy of all the item photographs they took!

Cordell research fellows – Dr. Arthur Anderson and Dr. Gabe Hrynick

“Normal” at the Peabody Institute also requires our volunteers to be around. We have all missed them this past year and are thrilled to welcome back our regular collections volunteers (and new ones!)

I don’t know how the next few months will look – mask or no mask, virtual or in-person – but it has been a real pleasure to jump back into the hectic schedule of the Peabody. Stay safe and healthy, everyone!