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Onalaska and Holmen eighth-graders got a day full of history education last week, with a frosting of fun.

Friday, the last of three groups of Holmen Middle School students got a taste of the immigrant experience when teachers and other volunteers turned La Crosse’s Riverside Park into Ellis Island, the famous New York portal for many newcomers to this country.

The tradition started 12 years ago, said teacher Karyn Tripp, and involves students taking an excursion on the La Crosse Queen riverboat as a substitute for the trans-Atlantic trips immigrants used to endure.

Once the students pulled into “port,” they had to go through 16 stations. Immigrants would have to go through numerous stations at Ellis Island to ensure they were fit to come into this country.

Many of the stations at Riverside Park echoed the ones used at Ellis Island, and in a way, the HMS students had almost as much at stake as the immigrants as getting through the stations successfully served as a test for them. Failing a station meant having to face deportation, or worse, the humiliation of having to sing a song from “Barney” in front of their classmates.

Tripp said the Ellis Island exercise is a multicurricular event, including history, social studies, language arts, science, health and more. It’s also something the students look forward to all year long.

Onalaska Middle School students in the 8E pod had just as much fun Friday without leaving the school. Their annual History Day event, also a multicurricular exercise, covered historic ages from the Roman Empire to the 1950s and ’60s.

Students could choose from numerous tasks that incorporated history and other aspects of their education. For example, students could take part in a fashion show, and this year they dressed in everything from a Victorian gown to a Rosie the Riveter outfit from World War II.

History teacher Gregg Hilker even got into the act, wearing a toga for the occasion.

Students also could choose to create skits or musical acts, be a contestant in “Who Wants to be an Emperor?,” participate in a catapult design contest or enter a team in the chariot race, an event that the whole school got to come out and watch.

“It’s kind of a culminating fun day,” said Hilker, though maybe not as fun as Valleyfair, the Twin Cities amusement park where the eighth-graders went this week.