Tuesday, Feb. 15, 2016 • The kindergarten class at Fletcher Walker celebrates 100 days of learning
Publisher’s note: This story originally appeared in the Tuesday, Feb. 16, 2016 edition of the Lassen County Times.

The number 100 is big to any kindergarten student, especially when he or she must press stickers in that amount to a superhero cape. That was the task teacher Cassandra Strand gave her students at Fletcher Walker Elementary as part of a lesson plan to commemorate 100 days of school Monday, Feb. 8.

The capes were an element of a super student costume the children created to defeat the evil Dr. Double Digit as they moved in their lessons to triple-digit numbers. Their mask was the number, 100, with the two zeros making perfect eyeholes.

This number did much more than improve the children’s math skills. It became an art lesson, with each student creating a portrait of how they might look at age 100. Strand also used it to improve writing skills with students journaling about what life might be like when they hit the century mark.

Some thought Jell-O, marshmallows and pudding might be on the menu; they envisioned gray hair, wrinkles and maybe a set of glasses to see better; and thought an outing with old friends might include playing cards, fishing or simply walking around looking at trees.

Once students had completed their costumes, they teamed up to build a structure out of 100 paper cups and were rewarded with cotton candy for being 100 days smarter. Before the final bell they went to the gym to find 100 balloons the sixth-grade class had inflated, which they were invited to pop.

They came to school dressed as someone old, quite difficult for students who on average were born five years ago. Many played the part with ingenuity… perhaps adding a drama lesson to the curriculum.
The 100th day of school was a time to celebrate all the learning that had taken place during the course of the 2015-2016 school year.

