A while back, we had an immigration unit. We researched a lot about immigrants, and a main research point was on Ellis Island. That was where all the third class immigrants got inspected. After all our research, we took our research a made a video about going through the whole journey as an immigrant. We were the actors, and it was pretty cool. Anyway, I learned back then that eventually we would be going through Ellis Island like an immigrant. I thought that was really exciting.

When the day we went to Ellis Island came, I was really excited. Our class split, and I sat with Mrs. Cooper’s class, and I was with a group with Barbara, Ally, Hana, Giana, and our chaperone, Barbara’s mom.

We finally got to Ellis Island after an hour and a half bus ride. We went inside a museum, and it was really cool because a ranger showed us around (The Baggage Room, The Registry Room, The Stairs of Separation) and he made us feel like real immigrants. We had free time, and during free time we could walk around to see the exhibits. I liked how there was self guided exhibits. The exhibits were on different subjects, some had immigrants talking about something like their journey, some were about the journey that the immigrants had, etc. We ate lunch outside on stone tables, and we had more free time after that. We also watched a short movie, kind of like the ones we made during our immigration unit. The movie was all about Ellis Island.

Eventually we took a ferry back to the buses, the same way we came, and the ferry took a route so that we could see the Statue of Liberty! She was smaller than I anticipated, but she was still a really amazing sight. I took a bunch of pictures of her, and here’s one:

I think this trip was really cool and fun, and I’m glad I went on it.