COAL GROVE — Students in grades 3-5, from the Dawson-Bryant Elementary Enrichment Program, participated in events last Monday to give them an idea of what a day in the life of renowned local author and educator Jesse Stuart would have been like.

The students have read six of Stuart’s junior novels this school year, explained Gifted Intervention Specialist Katie Hamm, and presented literary analyses of the books to their classmates in the one-room Buffalo schoolhouse building located on the grounds of Greenbo State Park.

The students also worked with staff from Greenbo and the Jesse Stuart Foundation to serve as tour guides at various locations related to Stuart, as part of their service-learning activity.

The students taught their peers, teachers, and community members about Stuart’s life through presentations at the Jesse Stuart monument, the original Stuart home place on W-Hollow, and the Plum Grove Baptist Church, where Stuart is buried.

In addition to the literary analyses and tour guide work, Hamm explained, students also hiked through Greenbo’s “Fern Valley,” participated in crafts, and took a pontoon ride to give them a better understanding of what life was like for Stuart during the 1940s.

Hamm praised the children’s work and attention, and gave special thanks to Debbie Barney and Jim Gifford for their help in planning the service learning opportunity for the students.