Next, it was the students turn. Now that they were more familiar with the cemetery and with different symbols and motifs above the ground, we asked them to select just one trait. Before setting them lose a second time, each group was given a single color of post-its. Their objective was to find as many headstones with their chosen symbol or motif and write just one year of death on each post-it. For example, students who chose daisies (sometimes representing youth and innocence) would go headstone to headstone looking for the specific flower, and when found they would write 1938 on a single post-it, and go on to find another. Students chose hearts, roses, vines, specific types of crosses, and hunting/fishing motifs to mention a few.
As a wrap up, we set up a graph to represent the frequency of each trait by decade. In general, traits demonstrated the “battleship” curve known in seriation studies for showing the introduction of a new trait, expansion of popularity over time, and then the truncating down as the trait diminishes. Students had no problem with analogies of what trends were popular today: skinny jeans, pop stars, and symbols of wealth (aka bling).
