Saturday, June 28, 1997
AHS thespians teach young students about life
By LESLIE STRADER / Abilene Reporter-News
Abilene elementary summer school students took a break from
the books Friday morning to learn a lesson about life from three
unlikely teachers - a lizard, a turtle and a mule.
Isaac Padillo, Chad Kennedy and Estee Byers from Abilene High
School's drama department volunteered their time to deliver a
message about perseverance to kindergarten through second-graders
enrolled in AISD's summer school program.
The three high schoolers painted their faces and donned animal
costumes to perform a story adapted from "The Odyssey of
Jeremy Jack." The lizard (Padillo) narrated the tale of a
race between a tortise (Kennedy) and a mule (Byers) to show the
children how sticking with something can make them winners, too.
Usually, summer school is strictly academics, but summer school
principal Ledessa White wanted to give the students as many different
opportunities to learn as possible.
"Academics are really stressed here," said White,
who is Valley View's principal during the school year. "There's
no music or P.E. going on during the summer - just good teaching.
But I think it's always difficult for students to want to go to
summer school, so we've been trying to make it fun for them.
"We want them to know they're important to us. That's
what this is all about."
This is the first time in memory summer school students have
had an outside program during their six-week session.
And, also for the first time, all elementary summer school
programs are being held under one roof at Thomas Elementary, where
the lazy days of summer simply don't exist.
White said 350 elementary summer school children and 50 faculty
members come to the campus every day for programs such as Speech
Camp, bilingual education, special education, or to work on filling
in learning gaps they may have missed during the school year.
Summer teachers, like Thomas kindergarten teacher Tammy Collins,
said having outside programs for the students in summer school
helps boost their self-esteem.
"We have kids in summer school coming from all different
areas of the district, with all different backgrounds, and not
all of them are exposed to these kind of things" she said.
"I think education is just exposing children to lots of
different life experiences, and I think we should be able to do
that in summer school as well as during the regular year."
Alta Vista first-grade teacher Hainey Price also believes her
summer schoolers will benefit from the outside lesson.
"I think it gives the kids a chance to do something fun,"
she said. "They work so hard all day, and during the regular
year, they get to do fun things like this quite often. This is
just another format for learning."
Pam Kennedy, parent of one of the drama students, coordinated
the performance at Thomas. She mentioned the program to White
earlier in the spring and they decided summer school would be
a good place to present it.
"The thing about summer school is if they miss three times,
they're out of the program," Kennedy said. "We thought
it was definitely something the kids needed to learn."
White said attendance has been steady this year. Every day,
at least 15 classes are reporting perfect attendance.
The high school students said they don't feel like they've
lost out on any sunning or sleeping in by taking time out to perform
for the youngsters.
"The kids really enjoy it and so do we," said Kennedy,
an AHS senior. "I understand a lot of these kids have special
needs. I hope we're giving them the drive to keep trying and not
worry what other people say."
"I think they'll remember this," said Padillo, a
junior. "For some of the kids, this is probably the first
time they've seen something live life this before. It's not just
Barney on TV. I'm pretty sure they'll take something home with
them."
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Abilene Reporter-News / Texnews / E.W. Scripps Publications
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