The Rookery

I've enjoyed watching how the Prairie Creek traditions have carried on during this year of transition in our school. I especially enjoy watching as the returning students excitedly share the traditions with our new friends. One favorite tradition is the all-school gathering. It's held each Friday morning, and the teachers take turns leading it. I was especially impressed with Nancy and Amy's ASG last week (and not just because of the Bert and Ernie headbands they wore). They told the students about the parent education night on math that we'd held the night  before, and then they engaged the students in a fun math activity that involved using their bodies to create equations that equaled 40 (the number of years Sesame Street has been on–see the brilliant connections?). The students worked in mixed-age groups, and they had a lot of fun physically displaying their math knowledge.

A 4/5 tradition (that has been adopted by other grades as well) is the ramble. Once a week, we take a hike somewhere. A favorite ramble destination is "the rocks", an outcropping of rocks at the rise in the field adjacent to our school. We look forward to the time when the field is cleared of corn or soybeans and we can strike out. This year, the returning students were dismayed to find that the rocks were gone! Gone! The Rocks! It was decided that we would create a new cairn. We encourage the kids to do service by picking up rocks as they walk, and so we began a new pile of those rocks we cleared from the growing areas of the field. We'll build a new "The Rocks". Rock by rock.  CTO