To start the week, library personnel asked teachers and staff to share their favorite toy from their childhood. After hearing a teacher?s story, students were shown pictures of the teachers from their childhood. Students then had to guess who the teacher was.
At the kickoff, the students also heard a story called, ?Alexander and the Wind-up Mouse,? by Leo Lionni. Willy, a wind-up mouse avoids being thrown away. Willy and Alexander?the real mouse that lives in the house?become friends and stay together forever.
The story spurred the idea of starting a toy drive.
?We thought many kids probably had toys in their toybox that they didn?t play with any more, but were still in good condition that could be given to other kids for Christmas,? said librarian Sandy Arnold.
?Families did a great job bringing in toys for a good cause.?
Other activities for the week included poetry breaks, DEAR time and the ?super secret toy of the day.? Poetry breaks at 10 a.m. were performed to the classes by fifth-grade students.
DEAR time stands for ?Drop Everything and Read.? Students took books with them wherever they went, except for lunch and recess. At a predetermined signal, they stopped what they were doing to read.
Every morning clues were given about the ?super secret toy of the day.? Students then turned in a guess and winners were drawn from each class. Winners came to the library to choose a toy from the ?toy box,? and toys were donated to the toy drive. The super secret toys were a Slinky, Legos, Mr. Potato Head, Play-Doh and a Barbie.
To end the week, students visited stations at various places within the school. Each station had something to do with toys.
In the gym, the students played ?Toy Story? tag. Students were frozen as characters from the movie and were freed when they were tagged by others and said the character?s famous line.
Another group danced to a song about toys performed by Alvin and the Chipmunks.
In another classroom, art teacher Rita Loewen helped students paint with marbles.
An age-old favorite game, Candy Land, was played in the library. The game board was stretched out across the library, and stuffed-animal book characters were used as pawns.
Students worked in groups to answer library questions. If they answered correctly, they drew a card and moved their pawn along the board.
?Traction Man? by Mini Grey was the featured story at another station. The story is about a young boy and his new action-figure toy, Traction Man, and their adventures. Helping tell the story was Kandis Pankratz and two local ?superheroes? Principal POW (Evan Yoder) and Counselor Courageous (Mike Moran).
At the last station, students played hangman and a coloring game with Mr. Potato Head.
