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Union Elementary kindergarten students celebrate Thanksgiving
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.Union Elementary School kindergarten students sang a song before eating during the school's Thanksgiving feast.
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.Union Elementary School kindergarten students lined up to get their food for the school's Thanksgiving feast.
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.Union Elementary School students lined up outside the school's cafeteria before the start of the Thanksgiving feast.
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Neighbors | Tim Cleveland.A Union Elementary School kindergarten student ate a carrot during her meal as part of the school's Thanksgiving feast.
By TIM CLEVELAND
Union Elementary School kindergarten students got a chance to celebrate Thanksgiving a couple days early during the school’s Thanksgiving feast on Nov. 25.
Union’s 58 kindergarten students gathered in the school’s cafeteria to enjoy a meal and also to learn lessons about the first Thanksgiving.
“We have always had a feast, but this is the first year that all three [kindergarten] classes came together,” Union kindergarten teacher Gina Chiaro said. “We thought it would be nice for them to mix and come together and pretend to be Indians and pilgrims.
“We’ve been talking about the first Thanksgiving and what it means.”
The students enjoyed food that was prepared by parent volunteers. The feast included turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes, stuffing, corn and desserts.
“It’s a nice way for them to get the real feel for the food,” Chiaro said.
Chiaro started the event by having the students sing the song “The First Thanksgiving” along with her before they lined up to get their food and start eating.
Chiaro said the students have been learning about the first Thanksgiving in class leading up to the feast.
“We are going to be talking how the pilgrims and the Indians came together and how the pilgrims had to learn from the Indians,” she said. “What kind of things they learned, how to plant and harvest their crops because the pilgrims didn’t know. We talked about the friendships that were built and friendship means and kindness and generosity and that kind of thing.”
Chiaro said the students have been learning many lessons about Thanksgiving.
“The lessons are that back in the day of the first Thanksgiving, they had to work the land, they had to work for their crops and for their food and it was a different time, it was a harder time,” she said. “They can learn to appreciate what they have today because it’s much simpler, how we can just go to the grocery store and we can buy our vegetables and our turkey, but they actually had to raise the turkeys. Teaching them about then and now and the differences between then and current times.”