Teaching In February

Over the years I have always liked teaching during the month of February. I have especially

enjoyed it here in Wilmington. The month is filled with numerous opportunities to explore great topics.

By February students are comfortable with their teachers and the teachers are comfortable with

their students. Classroom routines are on auto-pilot. Everybody knows what needs to happen.

Classroom life can be simpatico and copacetic---both congenial and very satisfying!!!

Of course the month starts off with talk of Punxsutawney Phil. The legend of the groundhog can

lead to discussions on “How is weather predicted? (science), How are shadows formed? (play shadow

tag), How do groundhogs live under ground? (research), or What is a groundhog called west of the

Mississippi? (vocabulary).”

If you are not a real fan of the whole groundhog legend, then you can spend some time at the

beginning of the month on heart health. The first Friday in February is Wear Red for Women's Heart

Health. This can be a fun health unit covering nutrition and exercise. Have the children listen to each

other's hearts with stethoscopes. If you don't have access to real stethoscopes. You can make

stethoscopes using an empty paper towel rolls and Solo plastic cups with the bottoms removed. Use

packing tape to secure the plastic cup to one end of the paper towel roll. Put the plastic cup against the

chest and the other end of the paper towel roll to the ear. You can really hear the heart beat after the

children jog in place for a few minutes.

Next we prepare for Valentine's Day. Assemble Valentine Holders for Party Day---shoe boxes,

tissue boxes, large manila envelopes, cereal boxes, sew two paper plates together, etc. When decorating

the containers, be careful to make certain that the children have ther names plainly displayed. Start

doing songs and finger plays about Valentine's Day. Incorporate a countdown to Valentine's Day in the

daily calendar activities. My favorite has always been:

I made a little Valentine. (Sung to: I KNOW A LITTLE PUSSY/

She wears a coat of red. Guiding with Jewels)

I gave her to my mother,

And this is what she said.

I may be just a Valentine

Of paper, lace, and glue,

But I am very special

For I say “I love you” (point at students)

-- 'n you, 'n you, 'n you,

And you, 'n you, 'n you, 'n you,

And you, 'n you, 'n you, 'n you,

'n you, 'n you, 'n you!

(When pointing, form your fingers to say “I love you” in American Sign Language)

The children generally prepare lunch as part of their party activities. Parents send in the

supplies. It is easy to prepare fun,finger sandwiches using heart-shaped cookie cutters---peanut butter

and jelly, pink tinted cream cheese, or heart shaped ham and cheese. Strawberries are a good fruit

because when sliced they look like hearts. Two Twinkies sliced diagonally can be made to look like

hearts when reassembled. I thought we would cry when the maker of Twinkies went out of business for

a period of time.

The parties always included some form of face painting. If I was the teacher running the face

painting center, then they got a simple red heart with Cupid's arrow shot threw it. However some

teachers were very clever and creative with the face painting. This activity affords the teacher an

opportunity to be one-on-one with each child. Plus the children got all that tactile stimulation on their

faces. As expected the fun part was the peek in the mirror when the face painting was finished.

Of course the best part of Valentine's Day was delivering all of Cupid's mail. With the younger

children, the parents were asked not to address the cards, but only have their children sign their cards. It

was a great way to practice one-on one correspondence. One card for each mailbox. With older children

it is fine to have them address and sign their cards. When the older children delivered their mail, they

had to practice reading the names of their classmates.

Next in February we concentrate on Presidents' Day. This is the holiday that really makes me

love teaching in Wilmington. Of course, Washington didn't sleep at the Burgwin-Wright House, but it

was here when Washington was our first President. Also Lincoln didn't visit Wilmington, but he did

travel by train. The Railroad Museum is a perfect Presidents' Day destination for the younger crowd

and the Cape Fear Museum is the perfect Presidents' Day destination for the older crowd. The dioramas

at the Cape Fear Museum depicting Civil War Battles are awesome.

Since I always taught on a year-around schedule, I liked to concentrate on Abraham Lincoln for

Presidents' Day and save more of George Washington for Independence Day. Wilmington was the

home of an actual signer of the Declaration of Independence, William Hooper, who lived off of

Masonboro Sound Road. There is an obscure headstone along the road to designate the location of his

home. Nothing like looking out at the same water that William Hooper saw. However, February 27th is

the anniversary of the Battle of Moore's Creek and a day trip out to the battle site would be very

enlightening and return you to 1776. Another worthwhile day trip is down to Fort Fisher and the Fort

Fisher Museum. I would start the Fort Fisher Day trip with a visit to Louise Wells Cameron Art

Museum. The grounds around the museum is the site of the Civil War Battle of Six Forks. Use a

circuitous route from Cameron Art Museum to Fort Fisher by way of Masonboro Sound Road and

Myrtle Grove Road in order to get a sense of what the Civil War soldier felt as he marched along under

some of those old live oak trees dripping with Spanish moss.

President's Day also lends itself to dressing up in beards, stove pipe hats, wigs and three-corner

hats. I always liked sharing the story of how Abraham Lincoln ended up with a beard when he was

campaigning because a young girl wrote him a letter. In addition Presidents' Day presents an

opportunity to compare and contrast what it is like to look at a painting versus looking at a picture. We

only have paintings of President Washington, but we have actual photographs of President Lincoln.

Singing songs typical of the Revolutionary War or the Civil War help children feel a connection to

history. Preschoolers love a good active rendition of “My Hat It Has Three Corners.”

I once visited a classroom in Indiana where the teacher used the concept of silhouettes to teach

math, art, science, and social studies. The teacher started the unit with the connection between

Groundhog Day and shadows. Next she created a “shadow art” silhouette of each student. The large

student silhouettes were put on display along with silhouettes of President Washington and President

Lincoln. Follow up work consisted of the students studying money and the relative value of coins

covered with silhouettes. For Mother's Day the teacher helped her students mount and frame their

silhouettes as gifts for their moms.

Of course Presidents' Day slides us into our last regular unit of the month---Dental Health. Poor

President Washington is never depicted with a smile in any of his portraits. His poor dental health sets

the stage for great discussions about the reasons to care for your teeth. Some of our best guest speakers

were the dentists and dental hygientists who came to visit with the students. Over the years we have

seen a great variety of puppet shows, videos, posters and brushing or flossing demonstrations. My two

favorite classroom activities were reading the story of DOCTOR DE SOTO and teaching the children

to floss. Developing fine motor skills isn't always achieved with pencil and paper. Working with the

turned over bottom of a paper egg carton and a piece of dental floss is quite skill building.

If you noticed I said that Dental Health was our last ”regular” unit for the month not our final

unit for February. February is a month that during some years you might include the Winter Olympics,

Chinese New Year, the Super Bowl, Mardi Gras, the 100th Day of School or Leap Year. February is also

Black History Month which with our students actually started with the celebration of Martin Luther

King's Birthday in January. In our classroom incorporation of Black History was always with

discussions of the importance of Abraham Lincoln as an outstanding and commendable president and

why we would pick the month of his birth to celebrate Presidents' Day. Depending on the age level

(which I point out because developmentally young children do not actually see skin color differences

until around five years of age), programs like “What's Wrong With Different?” are very good classroom

tools. “What's Wrong With Different?” was created in Wilmington by local YWCA staff members on

the premise that color is only skin deep and we are all the same color on the inside.