Jun. 17, 2021 -- Benjamin Franklin, Abner Doubleday and Jim Henson all visited Roxboro Elementary school on May 26. And miraculously, they were all wearing face masks and practicing social distancing!

Robyn Greenberg and Val Arnett’s 4th grade classes studied inventors for their annual Wax Museum project. Each student chose an invention that was of personal interest to them, researched the inventor and then embodied that person for a Covid-safe presentation to their schoolmates.

One chess playing 4th grader chose Han Xin, who invented the game, while a hockey player studied Frank Zamboni, inventor of the Zamboni machine that cleans the ice between periods.

Brendan West chose Doubleday, the inventor of modern baseball. He enjoyed the project despite how hard it was “to find all the information n and write it in my own words.” His only complaint was that “kindergartners have the attention span of a snap,” referring to the young children who made their way through the Wax Museum, stopping to push a button on the plastic shields and then listen (or perhaps not) to the 4th grader’s presentations.

Some of the students focused on obscure inventions, such as the Laserphaco Probe designed by Patricia Bath as a cataract treatment. Fourth grader Alyssa Hitchcock chose Ms. Bath’s invention because her own mother has vision problems. Alyssa thought the project “ was stressful at first because there wasn’t a lot of information on my person, but once I found one good site I learned a lot.”

Ashton Williams studied Alexander Winton, the inventor of the semi-truck, because “I love vehicles. My grandma says that when I was little, I would stand outside and point at all the cars and trucks.”

Aiman Assylkhan chose George Charles Devol Jr, who invented the first industrial robot and a robotic arm, “because I want to be an engineer when I grow up.”

In addition to the in-person presentations, the 4th graders created a FlipGrid with video presentations of each child’s chosen inventor to include the fully remote students. The videos were shared with parents who were unable to visit the Wax Museum because of Covid restrictions on visitors.

The students enjoyed getting to learn from each other as well. Adelaide Hallet said, ”It was interesting to see what my classmates are into and to learn about their inventors too.” All the students were most surprised to discover that high heeled shoes were invented by a man for men!