Inhabitants Learn About Their Planet

April 08, 1993|by STAN SCHAFFER, The Morning Call

A sparkling array of colorful study objects lined the halls and classrooms at the Northwestern Elementary School in The Earth and its Inhabitants festival.

The air was charged with energy and the laughter of children's voices as they held a miniparade through the school corridors as part of a five-day festival on the environmental theme.

The festival was a combination of events involving reading, writing, science, math and the arts.

The pupils wrote stories and poetry, created books, recorded information, designed posters and games, presented oral reports and performed in video productions and plays.

One night an estimated 1,500 parents and friends viewed the children's work.

Kindergarten teacher Mary Ellen Kmetz headed the parade.

Among teachers assisting the 452 children were Joan Ziegler, Carol Beidler, Marsha Johnston and Janet Werley.

Principal Mary Anne Wright, 22 teachers and 20 volunteers assisted with the project they had been working on since Jan. 1.

Some of the festival's activities also involved Northwestern High School students.

Maureen Pavlik's sixth-graders and Kmetz's pupils worked on a project related to endangered animals. Marie Demaree's 10th-grade students worked with Susan Hanlon's third-graders on a writing project about animals.

Steve Weiss' ninth- and 11th-grade students constructed a 50-foot humpback whale. The whale was made of large sheets of plastic and inflated with a large fan in the gym.

High school student council members dressed in costumes and read to the elementary classes.

Activities included a Heal the World Book Fair and a dress-up day, during which children portrayed their favorite animals and enjoyed a visit from Iggy the Iguana.

Other activities were schoolwide silent reading, a button contest, an animal presentation by the Trexler-Lehigh County Game Preserve, a teacher reading swap and essay reading.

Kindergarten and first-grade activities centered on a rain forest theme.

The children, teachers and volunteers re-created a tropical rain forest along the halls of their section of the school.

They heard and read about "The Great Kapok Tree," a tale of the Amazon rain forest, written by Lynne Cheery.

The children investigated the forest's inhabitants and the effects of the destruction of the rain forest.

Pupils and teachers also have donated money to adopt 2 acres of rain forest in the Rio Bravo Conservancy area in northwestern Belize.

Second-grade pupils focused on the inhabitants of the Earth. Activities emphasized the interaction of animals and people throughout the world.

Third-graders studied animals of the sea. The third-grade class has adopted a manatee and a whale to promote their effort to save specific endangered animals.

Fourth-graders investigated environmental issues. Activities included descriptive paragraphs, poems, stories and "ghostwriter" stories.

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