Students get history lesson

Gerald Cooper has traveled the world and steered a boat across the Panama Canal for 25 years.

Nowadays, he shares his love of foreign lands with students.

"So many people are not very well-versed in geography," said Cooper, a St. Petersburg resident. "And a lot of kids aren't thinking outside Tampa and St. Petersburg."

Cooper provided money for the Diocese of St. Petersburg to buy a Panama Canal Museum in a Trunk, an academic program created by the Panama Canal Museum in Seminole that teaches kids about how the development of the Panama Canal brought the world together.

Cooper visited Bishop Larkin Catholic School on Monday, where the fourth- and fifth-grade students have been working with the trunk this semester. It's full of books, DVDs, CDs, magazines, PowerPoint presentations, maps and artwork covering every aspect of the Panama Canal's history.

The students have made good use of the trunk.

"This is cross-curricular," said Mary Barzaley, a media specialist at the school. "This activity shows the value of thinking outside the classroom. It's not about what you do in class. It's how you apply it."

In social studies class, students learned about the structure of the canal and how to find Panama on a map, along with the numerous countries that use the canal for trade and travel purposes.

Students listened to native Panamanian music in Spanish class, and in art class created personalized pieces modeled after the artwork of the Kuna Indians.

They made models of the canal and of the gates and locks that raise the ships above sea level on the canal.

Cooper put their learning to the test, asking them why the canal was built.

"It took too long to get around South America," said Savannah Kelly.

Right.

"Without the canal, ships could not get across the land," Cooper said. "By building the canal, it made the route a lot easier. You could send cargo from Tokyo to Lisbon, Lisbon to San Francisco, Tokyo to Boston. They built the canal to create a shortcut for ships."

Cooper hopes that the Panama Canal Museum in a Trunk activity will inspire students to think globally, not just locally.

"This broadens their horizons," he said.