A celebration of learning

Every three weeks, the kindergarten classes at Sisters Elementary School open the classrooms to parents and other school helpers to celebrate the progress of the students.

Last week at 10:30 a.m. and again at 1 p.m., parents of kindergartners spent class time with their children absorbing the fun of the 100th day of class.

Some of the children had the idea this was to be the "last day of school," but both kindergarten teachers, Mrs. Kamrath and Mrs. Ritchie, lovingly convinced the children that there were a few more months of school - and a change in weather - to go before summer vacation rolled around.

The parent turnout in Mrs. Kamrath's classroom during the morning session was, for some reason, limited to all dads, prompting Chris Schaad, who was there with his son, Adam, to remark, "Yeah... we beat the moms out today... must be the weather."

Trevin Duey was there counting blocks with his daughter Brooke, along with Gabe Chladek and his son Bela, Ross Kennedy and his daughter Olivia, and Joie Patton with his daughter Julie. Each dad beamed at their child's ability to count to 100 with the use of one or another play elements in the classroom. In addition to the counting drill, some of the children shared books they were learning to read.

Before the children went off to lunch with their dads, Mrs. Kamrath demonstrated to the dads how she opens doors to concepts in math. Sitting the children in a semicircle in front of her, she had them count to 10, clapping their hands at each number as they did so. At the count of 10, she asked one of the children to stand, and then repeated the 10 count five more times until five children were standing.

"Do you think we're at 100?" Mrs. Kamrath asked the children, all of whom responded with a resounding "No!" At that point she introduced addition and multiplication to her enthusiastic students by asking the children how many number of counts of 10 each standing child represented. Once that concept was agreed upon, she then placed her hand on each standing child's head and counted, "Ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty," and asked, "is that 100?"

Again the children responded with a "No!" and the 10-count continued to nine more standing children. One girl suddenly got it, she leaped to her feet and began waving her hand frantically. With a smile, Mrs. Kamrath asked her to speak, and the other children listened as she excitedly exclaimed how she got to 100 by adding one more standing classmate.

Mrs. Ritchie had similar experiences with the help of a good mixture of moms and dads in her classroom, plus two of her former students - fourth-grader Becca Byrg and Sisters High School senior Breezy Tewalt. Becca kept pestering Mrs. Ritchie with a request to come and help during the Celebration of Learning until the grateful teacher contacted Becca's teacher and got permission for Becca to attend.

Breezy is well on her way to becoming a teacher in her own right. In addition to finishing her high school classes for graduation, she's taking pre-ed classes at COCC.

Readin', writin' and 'rithmetic are vital to our community's young, growing minds, and it was plainly seen that many of the parents of these excited kindergartners were grateful for the exceptional learning experiences Sisters Elementary School is providing for their children.