The Teaching History Her Way Podcast · CherylAnne Amendola

Community Collaboration with April Wills

January 24, 2024·29 min·1 clip

A student recorded her great-grandmother’s bridge story before the woman died years later.

Sheryl Ann opens the episode by welcoming listeners back and introducing April Wills as a teacher she got to know through Instagram. April teaches in rural Montana and works at a University of Minnesota K-12 school. She describes herself as an educational enthusiast who believes in hands-on, minds-on learning. Sheryl Ann frames the conversation around community connections and practical ideas for history teaching. April talks about how she looks for ways to connect classroom learning with the world around her. The episode keeps its focus on teaching history in a way that feels more complete and more human. April shares a project built around the Homestead Act. Students surveyed their school and playground. They then used topographic maps to think about where a homestead should go. The class had to consider land, rivers, and how settlement might work on the ground. That work helped students see history as decisions shaped by place. April describes how the project unfolded over a week. Her students built plywood boards and mapped where crops would grow. They also decided whether their homestead would be a farm, a ranch, or both. The science teacher joined in and helped bring native Montana species into the project. That cross-curricular piece added another layer of collaboration. April says the best part was watching the projects sit at the back of the classroom and draw in other students. Younger and older students kept stopping to ask questions. The attention created a new kind of relationship piece in the room. The project became something the whole school could see and talk about. Sheryl Ann responds with enthusiasm and points out how relevant the history became once students could connect it to today. She notes that not every teacher has a whole team ready to collaborate, but that many have at least one colleague they can work with. The episode keeps returning to that practical optimism. It suggests that good history teaching can start with one strong idea and grow through collaboration. It also shows how community, student curiosity, and careful planning can make a lesson feel bigger than the room it began in. April's approach stays rooted in history, place, and student participation. The conversation ends with a sense that history teaching gets stronger when students can see their work matter to other people.

As heard by us

Hands on community work gives this history lesson its clearest pull.

April Wills reads as a teacher who puts community and collaboration at the center of the work. The strongest material is the project based section: students survey the school and playground, work with topography maps, weigh Homestead Act choices, and build boards with crop and…

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Why you'd press play

You want a teacher conversation that turns history and social studies into more complete, diverse stories through hands-on, community-linked work.

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