Allows students to give back to the community
Staff writer
As a literacy project, Marion Elementary School students will study “Charlotte’s Web” for the next five weeks.
Title 1 teachers Shannon Cooper and Cindy Vinduska organized the One Book, One School program, having the entire school participate.
The depth of the project differs for each grade. Kindergarten and first-grade teachers will read the 184-page book aloud to their students, a chapter at a time. Fifth- and sixth-grade students each received a copy of the book to read individually.
“For younger grades, it’s a fun story,” Vinduska said. “Older grades study vocabulary.”
Laura Baldwin is using the story to teach character development and work on writing with her students. Other classes are using the story as an entry point for topics in other subjects. Some classes are studying spiders in science classes because Charlotte’s life cycle is an important plot point in the story. First-graders are learning about farm animals and doing farm-related activities. Students are also making spider webs in art classes.
Cooper and Vinduska have created weekly events to coincide with storylines in the book. When the class gets to the part when Fern takes Wilbur to the fair, the school will rent a cotton candy machine.
The culminating event for the school is the food drive, which began Thursday and is continuing over the course of the five weeks. Students brought in 651 items on Thursday; Vinduska and Cooper are hoping to collect 1,000 food items for the Marion County Emergency Food Bank by the end of the drive.
Before students began Christmas break on Dec. 22, Cooper and Vinduska brought in a 10-month-old piglet from Terry Olson’s farm, to introduce the concept of a school-wide “Charlotte’s Web” program. They also said the pig would return at the culmination of the food drive and the winning classroom could select a MES staff member to kiss the pig.
When the final tally of food items was announced Thursday, students stopped what they were doing to hear the announcement of the final count.
Julie Trapp’s third-grade class won Thursday. In a quick poll of class members at lunch, Secretary Deb Shipman, Trapp, gym teacher Charlotte Waner, Principal Rod Garman, and music teacher Adam Johnson were the top candidates to kiss the pig Feb. 4.