CEDAR FALLS - As the bell rings outside the Little Red Schoolhouse, teacher Linda Bohr calls her students.

"OK, you need to bring the toys in and come back out for the pledge."

Children scramble to bring jump ropes, wooden hoops and pick-up sticks into the building. Then they form a line on the sidewalk facing the flag. A number of the girls wearing full-length dresses that look like they're from an earlier era.

Before students say the Pledge of Allegiance, Bohr reminds them to eliminate "under God" from their recitation. At the Little Red Schoolhouse, the year is 1914. It wasn't until decades later that the phrase was added.

Bohr's 20 students range from first- to sixth-graders, but they all march into the school's single room to find their desks. They will spend the morning writing, reading, singing and learning together.

It's all part of a weeklong summer enrichment program operated by the Cedar Falls Historical Society. Four other sessions are held throughout the summer, including this week and next week.

The intent is "to give them an idea what a one-room schoolhouse would be like," says Joe Bohr, Linda's husband and assistant in the classroom. The schoolhouse, at First and Clay streets downtown, was built in 1909 and originally in Bennington Township.

As the couple drills the students on what they learned the day before, answers are written in chalk on slates. Each child holds up their slate for the teachers to see when they're finished. The children practice writing out Roman numerals as part of their review.

"We do math and especially Roman numerals, because they don't get that in public schools," says Joe Bohr. The students' history lesson focuses on Abraham Lincoln.

When Linda Bohr pulls out the McGuffey's Reader, she notes 11-year-old student Becky Ochoa's dislike of the standard reading book for that time.

"They're very boring, and they're just dull and kind of weird," said Ochoa, a Cedar Falls resident, who has participated in the program during past years.

Samantha Macs, a 10-year-old student from Austin, Texas, says the books are interesting because they are from a different time.

"I like the idea of old-fashioned," notes the girl, who was in town visiting her grandparents. "I think I learn a lot of history in all of this."

Both she and Ochoa mention how the Lincoln Memorial has 56 steps, indicating the age Lincoln died at, and 36 pillars, representing the country's 36 states at the time of his death.

"I've been to the memorial, but I never saw it, I never realized it," says Macs. "I wondered why there were so many steps."

Some of the students take things a step further when they go to the schoolhouse. Abby Hays, 10, comes to class wearing a dress and bonnet.

"My grandma, she made so many outfits for me that are old-fashioned just for the Little Red Schoolhouse," she says. Hays, of Waterloo, says she enjoys wearing them.

"I just feel more into it; I just feel part of the old time," she says.

Both Linda and Joe Bohr are retired teachers who volunteer their time with the summer program.

Linda Bohr says she likes how the day involves no papers for her to fill out, no requirements to complete, no standardized tests to take.

"It's just pure fun," she said. "This is pure teaching. This is what we always wanted to do."

Contact Andrew Wind

at (319) 291-1507 or

andrew.wind@wcfcourier.com.