Pages for Peace

Last year, we wrapped up our Pennies for Peace project with a visit from Betsy Sawyer and some of her students from the Bookmakers and Dreamers Club. The students brought some sample pages from the 10 x 12-foot book, and explained the evolution of the project and the difficulties they encountered in finding the right paper, ink, and design.

The book, which includes our students' collages, is now finished, but the club still needs to raise the funds that will make this world's largest book's publication possible.

If you would like to contribute to the cause of seeing the Groton-Dunstable Bookmakers and Dreamers Club's 7-year-long dream of creating the world's largest book become a reality, please visit http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1997534224/the-big-book-pages-for-peace-project.

Our Fundraising Campaign

Our campaign wound down last week and Fidelity Bank recounted all of our coins for us. We raised $175 for the Central Asia Institute!

In the next two weeks we'll be finishing up our comparison/contrast essays and writing about what we learned through Pennies for Peace.

We are still working on getting Betsy Sawyer to come to our school to speak to all the students about Pages for Peace, the big book in which the students' collages will appear.

Lastly, if we have time, we will be putting together a PowerPoint presentation on our Pennies for Peace journey to present to the school.

Thank you to everyone who gave pennies (and some nickels, dimes, quarters, and dollars) that we can send to CAI in the form of a check for the education of children halfway around the world.

A special "thank you" to Teacher Kristen Lynch for her hard work and patience, and to LAW Principal Patricia Fitzgerald for her wholehearted support.

Look for a summary here in the coming days and weeks, before the end of the school year.

Learning and Writing about Differences and Similarities in Cultures

Yesterday the students began examining the differences and similarities between their traditions, food preferences, clothing, and methods of play with those of children in Pakistan. They also discussed similarities and differences between themselves and other students in their own classroom.

They came up with several ways to show acceptance of differences, and also how to react when someone is getting teased for being different. We used food preferences as an example, since some students do get teased at school for eating foods that other students do not like.

The class concluded that it really does not matter whether or not someone likes to eat things that they don't, and that sticking up for another student does not necessitate a negative or sarcastic response; rather, a gentle reminder or show of support for the person being teased.

The class voted on focusing on traditions and fun as the basis for their comparison/contrast short essay. We used a Venn diagram to illustrate some of the similarities and differences between the kinds of play in the U.S. and Pakistan. They then listed them in a comparison/contrast "pillar" that will be the basis for their writing.

Next time we meet, we will work on finishing our pillar and do our writing. In the meantime, the students are still counting and rolling pennies. We have over $100 thus far.

Our Corporate Sponsor

The students' culture quilt before they added the border.

Our local branch of Fidelity Bank at 21 Main Street agreed to be our Pennies for Peace sponsor! We gave them a large can for donations, and a poster designed by 5th-grade student Riley Korhonen. Both are prominently displayed in front of the tellers.

The students spent part of Friday putting together a formal thank-you letter to the bank. Ms. Lynch decorated it with a photo of pennies, and Michael Sowa was the lucky winner of the opportunity to hand write the entire thing. Ms. Lynch then attached some orange construction paper to the letter and all of the students signed it. I was so proud to take it into the bank.

We also put our culture quilt on display at the end of the second floor hallway near the copier. The students finished it on Wednesday, after which Ms. Lynch and I presented it, along with other projects, to the Shirley School Committee and Superintendent Mac Reid. We explained the project and thanked Principal Pat Fitzgerald and the Shirley Educational Foundation for all of their support. We also thanked Art Teacher Sarah Russell for her help with the collages. This is truly becoming a community-wide effort.

As of the end of school on Friday, the students had counted $82 in pennies, and there are still more to count. Our goal is to raise $600--enough to pay a teacher's salary in Afghanistan or Pakistan for a year--by May 13.

Counting Pennies that Transform Lives

Today we made our first announcement on the intercom about the penny drive. We also went around the school putting up posters that remind students to bring in their pennies. They look great!

I had the privilege of visiting and speaking with the 5th-grade students today, and showed them the 12-minute introductory video about Pennies for Peace. The 5th-graders were very enthusiastic and may help us compose questions for our future Muslim guests, as well as make us some more posters.

Our third-grade class discussion today centered on our culture quilt. We compared and contrasted the food, clothes, fun activities, and traditions we have in the U.S. with those in Pakistan. Next week we will finish that discussion and write some comparison/contrast "pillars" that will be the foundation of some of our writing.

My son Dana is counting Friday's "take" as I write, and we are up to over $35 already! Lura White families "rock!"

How Much Does a Penny Buy?

Today the students wowed me with just how much they had gotten done while I was away. They finished their promotional posters, and created their classroom cultural quilt. The quilt shows how each student likes to dress, have fun, celebrate family traditions, and eat his or her favorite foods.

The quilt will be used to compare and contrast our cultures with those of our classmates and the children of Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The posters will be placed around the school to remind students, staff and parents to bring in their pennies to donate to the Central Asia Institute.

Today we decorated our Pennies for Peace containers and wrote our script for morning and afternoon announcements about the campaign. We hope to visit each classroom at the school very briefly to show students what the containers look like and remind them about where they are located.

We are in the process of finding a local corporate sponsor who will allow us to leave one of our penny containers, along with a poster, inside the sponsor's business.

On Friday, we will finish decorating our quilt and look at the differences and similarities between our cultures.

We now have an email address to which you can send any questions or suggestions: lurawhiteforpeace@yahoo.com.

Promoting Peace, One Penny at a Time

Over the past six weeks, Ms. Lynch's 3rd-grade students have been creating geographical flip books and bar graphs, and are now working on posters and strategies for the promotion of our school-wide campaign. Our goal is to raise awareness and pennies to donate to the Central Asia Institute for the building of schools in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The flip books look great. Each student started by stapling together seven overlapping pages. The top page says, "Where in the World Do I Live?" and has a self-portrait on it. The succeeding pages go from the student's street address, to the town, to the state, to the country, to the continent, to the planet on which he or she lives.

As a class we made one large flip book for the children of Korphe, showing that they live in Korphe, in the region of Baltistan, in the country of Pakistan, on the continent of Asia, on our Planet Earth.

The bar graphs we made compare the value of pennies in the U.S. to their value in Pakistan and Afghanistan. The students learned that the exchange rate is currently about 85 Pakistan Rupees (PKR) for each U.S. Dollar (USD). Whereas $1 might buy a small candy bar here in the U.S., it would pay a teacher's salary for half a day in Pakistan.

We are working on getting a local corporate sponsor for our campaign, and will soon be sending a message home to parents about how we can all contribute--one penny at a time--to the education of children around the world.

Look for examples of the students' work in the display cases at the front of the school building, and for our posters and penny donation containers in the coming weeks.