
{"id":10898,"date":"2010-06-10T13:18:36","date_gmt":"2010-06-10T21:18:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/?p=10898"},"modified":"2010-06-10T13:20:06","modified_gmt":"2010-06-10T21:20:06","slug":"trees-students-take-center-stage-at-carrboro-elementary-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/2010\/06\/10\/trees-students-take-center-stage-at-carrboro-elementary-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Trees, students take center stage at Carrboro Elementary"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Kate Griesmann<br \/>\n<\/strong><em>Staff Writer<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Carrboro  \u00e2\u20ac\u201c As the sun started to set on a perfect June day, more than 100 first-graders jumped to their feet and burst into song. <\/p>\n<p>A chorus to the tune of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve Been Working on the Railroad\u00e2\u20ac\u009d filled the tree-lined amphitheater at Carrboro Elementary School, entertaining over 150 parents and siblings who sat on blankets, eating the last of their picnic dinners. The words to the familiar song, however, were changed to something a little more fitting for the occasion: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been learning about trees.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d <\/p>\n<p>The students and their teachers and families gathered Tuesday night to celebrate the publication of The <em>Trees of Carrboro Elementary<\/em>, a guidebook containing poems, photographs and illustrations by the school\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s first-graders. The book highlights 40 trees that are scattered across the school\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s campus and around Carrboro.<\/p>\n<p>First-grader Peyton Bivins flipped to the page dedicated to the Shagbark Hickory, which features a photo of her and a classmate under a tree. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s one right over there!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she said, looking up and pointing across the clearing. Peyton is in one of the school\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s two dual-language first-grade classes, and the poem on the Shagbrook Hickory page is written in Spanish. <\/p>\n<p>Kitty Heller, a first-grade teacher who is retiring this year, spearheaded the project, which was funded by an N.C. Beautiful Grant in collaboration with the Duke Energy Foundation. The project lasted most of the year, as students recorded seasonal changes in trees, wrote poems and created tree-identification signs to put up around campus. <\/p>\n<p>Heller, who got to know all the schools in the district during her time as a substitute teacher, has always loved the campus of Carrboro Elementary. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153This is by far, in my opinion, the most beautiful playground and campus,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she said. When she learned about the N.C. Beautiful Grant, she saw an opportunity to celebrate the school\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s beauty while teaching her students about the nature that surrounds them. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It just seemed like the perfect thing to do.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d <\/p>\n<p>Leif Gjestvang-Lucky, who attended the event with his family, contributed to the Dogwood page. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The leaves on the bottom feel really different than they do on the top,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said, explaining that the tree only blooms in April, when the photograph included in the book was taken. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The best part was writing down about the trees and getting to feel the leaves,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said, though he added that seeing the final project was pretty exciting too. <\/p>\n<p>Up on stage, two pint-sized emcees, Margaret Stoffregen and Leonardo Salazar, speaking English and Spanish, announced the performers and thanked the families and teachers for coming to the event. Selected students from all four classes recited their poems, shouting to make their voices heard without the help of a microphone. <\/p>\n<p>After more singing, the families split into groups to go on a tree walk and look at the book that was the end product of months of hard work. <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153The stars of tonight are your children,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Heller told the assembled parents before the groups split up. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153You will be so impressed by what they have done.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d <\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_10899\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-10899\" style=\"width: 500px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/2010\/06\/10\/trees-students-take-center-stage-at-carrboro-elementary-2\/kids-singing-tree-song\/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-10899\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/06\/KIds-singing-tree-song.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"KIds-singing-tree-song\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" class=\"size-full wp-image-10899\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/06\/KIds-singing-tree-song.jpg 500w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/06\/KIds-singing-tree-song-113x84.jpg 113w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/06\/KIds-singing-tree-song-150x112.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/06\/KIds-singing-tree-song-360x270.jpg 360w, https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/06\/KIds-singing-tree-song-106x80.jpg 106w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-10899\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">PHOTO BY SUSAN DICKSON. First graders at Carrboro Elementary School sing and dance to celebrate the publication of their guidebook, The Trees of Carrboro Elementary, in the amphitheatre at Carrboro Elementary on Tuesday.  <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As the sun started to set on a perfect June day, more than 100 first-graders jumped to their feet and burst into song. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":10899,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10898","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-schools"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10898","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10898"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10898\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10906,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10898\/revisions\/10906"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10899"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10898"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10898"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10898"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}