Chandler Elementary School kindergartner Jordan Cisneros learned the pilgrims sailed across water on the Mayflower and did not have houses after they landed in the New World in 1620.
“My favorite part was eating the food,” said Jordan, 5, who ate stone soup with his classmates.
Chandler Elementary kindergarten teacher Ashton Francis passes out “stone soup” to her students as part of her class’s event that celebrated Native American culture ahead of Thanksgiving.
Matthew Westmoreland | mwestmoreland@vicad.com
Cassidy Olson’s kindergarten class celebrated Native American culture and the history of Thanksgiving on Friday.
Olson, who has taught at Chandler Elementary for four years, has used the celebration as a teaching tool for eight years.
“It’s one of my all-time favorites, especially trying to teach them friendship and getting along,” Olson said. “That’s been our big key these past two weeks — friendship.”
The two-week lesson started with expository texts about the pilgrims, Olson said. The students created sentences based on what they read and learned.
The sentences during that first week were put into a book about the pilgrims’ voyage; when they landed; how Squanto, a member of the Patuxet tribe, helped them; how everyone had a job to do; and the first Thanksgiving, she said.
During the second week, the class learned about Native American customs and discussed their own Thanksgiving traditions, she said.
“They are learning how to take letters to build words,” Olson said, adding she taught them that Native Americans used symbols.
Jaxon Edwards, 5, left, fixes his hat while Brielle Wibbenmeyer, 5, and Jaiden Hernandez, 5, perform a Native American-inspired dance for parents ahead of Thanksgiving.
Matthew Westmoreland | mwestmoreland@vicad.com
Students came up with their own stories and created garments that they wore Friday with symbols that described them, she said. They also created their own Native American names using adjectives.
“One of our TEKS (Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills) is wants and needs,” she said. “We took things that they want and need and what they are thankful for … wrote them down and made a book.”
The lesson also included the class’ daily poetry using sight words and the illustrations they create to promote reading skills, she said.
“Several of the songs we were singing were poems that they had worked on and practiced reading,” she said. “In kindergarten, we are teaching them how to read left to right, how to match words and break up that even a word that has multiple syllables is still one word.”
Students also learned about 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional shapes when they made tepees and glued different shapes to them, Olson said.
Chandler Elementary students eat “stone soup” as part of the kindergarten celebration of Native American culture ahead of Thanksgiving.
Matthew Westmoreland | mwestmoreland@vicad.com
The class also made stone soup to teach sharing and friendship, she said.
“Each child brought in one thing to put in our soup, and this morning we all sat down and put them in our soup,” she said.
The lessons and activities are age-appropriate, Olson said.
“What we focus on is the friendship, that these pilgrims came trying to seek a better life and that they faced a lot of hardships and that Native Americans had a choice to make, they could help them or they could be mean to them,” she said. “We talked about Squanto, and we talked about how he was mistreated by early settlers and that even though people were mean to him, he wasn’t mean back. He chose to help them, and because of that, they had a successful harvest, and they got to have a wonderful feast because they got along.”
Parent Marlene Arguelles attended the celebration because her daughter, 5-year-old Emma Salazar, is a kindergartner.
Arguelles, who has lived in the United States for three years after moving from Mexico, said the Thanksgiving holiday is different in her home country, adding she enjoyed the student showcase.
Her oldest daughter, who is 16, told Arguelles they discussed in class what they were thankful for in time for Thanksgiving.
Brittany Rodriguez, 24, reads a Thanksgiving-themed “Did you know?” book with daughter Sophia, 5, during Chandler Elementary’s kindergarten celebration of Native American culture.
Matthew Westmoreland | mwestmoreland@vicad.com
“It’s important for them to learn about the origins of the culture,” Arguelles said. “They learn in a way they enjoy it.”
Parent Dylan Lopez watched as his 5-year-old son, Luke, tasted stone soup. Lopez moved from Southern California six years ago, and several of his relatives are Native American.
“I think it’s appropriate,” Lopez said of the celebration of Native American culture.