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Dobbins students get taste of pioneer life
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Even while they were busy making rhythm drums, Galena Lopuchovsky (left), Robbie Murray, and Brennen Testa still looked happy working with their hands and showing off their pioneer outfits.
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Nick Havlin (left), Sarah Butch, and Erika Pallante looked happy to take a breather from their labor-intensive mosaic project.
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Neighbors | Sarah Foor .Dobbins student Marley McConnel fashioned an “M” in her tin plate at the Pioneer Day tin tooling station.
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After lunch time, Dobbins fourth-graders were taught how to line dance in the school’s activity room.
By SARAH FOOR
Students at Dobbins Elementary learn in their history classes that Poland was the first charted township in the Western Reserve settlement. This piece of their collective history inspires the school to celebrate Pioneer Day, to explore the ways in which those brave first settlers lived in Ohio.
On Feb. 10, Dobbins students attended school in old-fashioned outfits, including suspenders and bonnets, created labor intensive hands-on crafts, and watched presentations on pioneer life. Craft stations were placed throughout classrooms and the schools activity rooms, and the students created rain sticks, mosaics, rhythm drums and learned needlepoint and metal tooling skills.
PTO volunteers like Lisa Havlin were happy to see the students having fun with the activities.
“I think the kids forget that they can do so much with just their hands, without video games and computers. It’s amazing to walk through the school today and see the kids so happy to do all of these crafts that sometimes need a bit of elbow grease,” said Havlin.
The day-long event is the project of fourth-grade teacher Elaine Morlan. Her Pioneer Day is the culmination of a history unit on pioneers for her students.
“I hope that the students learn through our Pioneer Day that life wasn’t all fun and games for the settlers, but that it was nonetheless a very rewarding life to live,” shared Morlan.
Dobbins students enjoyed herself during the school’s activities, but was honest about her outlook on Pioneer life.
“I don’t think I could do all that pioneer work — it’s really hard. The crafts are really fun though,” she added.
Nick Havlin was thankful for the experience.
“We’ve only read about all this before today. I think we did stuff with Pioneer Day that we might only do once in our lifetime.”