• Middle School Model Railroad: the rise of Rock Ridge

• Middle School Model Railroad: crew lounge

• Middle School Model Railroad: a kink

• Middle School Model Railroad:quarantine quandary

The model railroad I’ve been building in my middle school classroom has been more or less frozen in time since students went home due to Covid last March. Teaching remotely was and remains a tremendous challenge for all parties involved, and when most students started returning to campus a few months ago the transitions and complications were even more challenging, taking a big toll on my outlook for my unique circumstances of being able to leverage my hobby interests in my professional life. 

I'm really sorry, this is going to be absurdly brief and unhelpful. I'm in my classroom scrambling to set up the layout that I put into the deep freeze last March, so it will be ready for a visit from some of my students this Wednesday. I took 5 minutes to whip out my phone and post this quick thought blob. 

https://youtu.be/-mhy7PDtqm0

I noticed an ugly curve in my trackwork the other day and made a mental note to improve it at some point. I was surprised that I would have put it in that way, but my memory isn’t very good and perhaps I was rushing it. 

Then yesterday I was looking for a photo to illustrate student activity on the model railroad and happened across one that I took last year, indicating that the track originally had a more reasonable curve that had apparently moved considerably. 

Today, Monday March 16, students stayed home from school while the faculty and administration figured out how we would continue the school year under challenging circumstances. 

Like many of my middle school students, our Park Day Railway is in the midst of a growth spurt.

This is embarrassing, but having heard that confession is good for the soul I shall proceed. 

The railroad I’ve been building with kids in my middle school classroom is sectional - designed to dismantle and store every summer because my room gets used by a summer camp program and then again by a Maker Fair

I have received great advice from the folks on this forum as my plan for the Day Branch extension of the railroad in my middle school classroom has evolved (see earlier threads on this blog), and I’d settled on a si

I know better, but it looks like I’m going to do it anyway: hidden staging.