2015 Year End Activities and Culture Week

With only TWO school days left I thought I should post now while I still have time! The last few weeks have flown by and given our kids a chance to do some really fun and creative activities. During 'Culture Week,' volunteers from all over the village came to school as teachers of traditional Yupik crafts. Boys were show how to make soap carvings (meant to represent walrus tusk carving), model boats, and steam bath dippers (used to pour water over the hot coals.) Meanwhile, girls learned beading, crochet.

Villagers also brought in crafts to display.

Third and fourth grade girls

Kindergarten and first grade

Third and fourth grade boys

High school boys made tractional style knives.

High school girls sewed their very own 'kuspuks' traditional Yupik style shirts.

To honor our elders, I led the third graders in the making of a model mud hut (the traditional style of Yupik housing.) Before we started the project we looked at pictures of villages in the Lower Kuskokwim area from as far back as 1930. The students were fascinated to see how much their region has changed, and what things remained the same. Each student used adjectives and drawings to explain what their village elders were like.

One of the pictures I showed my students. Bethel in the 1930s.

A Yupik mud house from the Lower Kuskokwim Area.

A modern Yupik mud house ;)

Students were given the template, "My elders are ______,______and________." They did a great job and a few students even came up and told me, "Mr. Allen! I even drew the wrinkles on the face!" Hahaha so cute.

I told my students to write to themselves in the future! They got a big kick out of the idea I asked them what things they want to remind themselves of next year as fourth graders.

I reminded them, "The next time you read these letters, you'll be fourth graders."

A short lesson on perception and styles of art

Many of the kids are left to fend for themselves on the playground and around the village over the summer. So, to help prepare them, we spent a long time talking about how to treat others and what bullying does to the victim and the bully. Students filled two versions of themselves with words. The prompts were, 'When I am nice it fills me with…. and, When I bully it fills me with __________.' I hope they all stay safe this summer.

Today, Mrs. Allen and I made a special home visit to deliver a gift to a very special student. This student had perfect attendance all year. She put her new sweater on immediately, and I hope it will be with her for a while.