Hershey Mass Production

We're currently studying the Northeast region in social studies. One of our essential questions is, "Why did our nation's first factories start here?" We learned that the water and people in the Northeast region influenced factories being built here. Many factories were built near rivers and used the water to power their factories. In addition, the Northeast's population provided people power for the factories.

We "stopped" at the Hershey Factory to learn about mass production. Students worked in groups of three and specialized in one job: wrap cutter, candy placer, or candy wrapper. For three minutes, students worked in an assembly line to (re)wrap Hershey Kisses. Groups wrapped between 8 and 15 pieces of candy during this time.

After the activity, we thought a little about what it would be like to work in a factory, specializing in one job, for a 40 hour work week. Many students recognized it may not be as exciting to do the same job for eight hours a day as it was to do it for three minutes in class.

The video below includes some photos and video of our mass production.

Hershey Mass Production from kate mills on Vimeo.