Gettysburg Lesson

I have been frustrated with the students' actual internalization of Gettysburg, what happened and its significance. So I went to Home Depot and bought some blue and red line marking paint and went out of the field behind the school and mapped out the valley of Gettysburg. We divided into the North and South. We spent one day (day one) on McPherson's Hill and actually applied what we had learned. Next day, we added "Capture the Flag" to the mix. The Confederates had to get the flag by flanking the Union either around Little Round Top or Culp's Hill. They couldn't come straight in. They realized that they couldn't break the defenses to get the flag. Then for our 3rd day, the Confederates had to make a frontal assault "up" Cemetery Ridge. They discovered it was impossible. At that point, they began to understand why Longstreet had advised against such an assault. They kept asking why the North didn't try to get their flag, then realized the differences between an offensive battle against entrenched troops and being on the defense. I believe my entire class now "understands" what happened at Gettysburg. (And we all had fun!)