Linwood Elementary wanted to do something to give back to the community. Students were encouraged to bring in pop tabs to benefit the Ronald McDonald House, a charity that assists the families of sick children. (For more information on the Ronald McDonald House and the amazing services they provide, please visit their website: http://www.rmhc.org/what-we-do). Each classroom was given a large plastic jar to collect the tabs. This was an effort that was decided on late in the year, so the kids only had a couple months to collect the tabs. Administration hoped that each class could fill their tub, but realistically expected only a few would have the time and buy-in to do so. Nobody expected the wonderful reponse the students had to this challenge. Not only did ALL the classrooms fill their jars, most filled them more than once! Mrs. Magnuson's Kindergarten class alone filled their jar to overflowing 9 times! The Linwood students collected nearly 14 boxes of pop tabs, far exceeding expectations! Ronald McDonald House Charities Thank-You Letter
Way to go Linwood students!
The students had some incentives to bring in the pop tabs. Each jar was marked with three lines. When the pop tabs reached the first line, the classroom earned an extra half hour of recess with. The second line earned the class a movie and popcorn in their room. The most fun, however, was when the pop tabs reached the top line. For each classroom that reached the top line on the jar, the teacher qualified to compete in silly contests against their fellow teachers. The winner of the silly competition earned the chance for his/her entire class to throw pie at the principal, Mr. Caldwell! Every class filled their jar at least once, so all 16 teachers competed in front of the entire school in the silly games on the last day of classes.
There were four contests, each knocking out half the competition. In the first contest, all sixteen teachers competed trying to empty a tissue box, one tissue at a time, as fast as they could. Sixteen teachers quickly became eight victors. Those eight victors moved onto the next round.
In round two, the remaining eight teachers each had a cookie placed on their forehead. Without using their hands, the teacher had to get the cookie to their mouth. If the cookie dropped, they raised their hand for a replacement cookie. The first four to successfully get the cookie to their mouth moved onto the next round.
In round three, the remaining four teachers had to dip their nose in petroleum jelly, pick up as many cotton balls as possible using only their sticky noses, then race across the stage to drop the cotton balls into a container, without using their hands. The two teachers with the most cotton balls after one minute earned their way into the finale.
The finalists were Mrs. Guptil, who teaches sixth grade, (and got to the finale despite being on crutches!); and Ms. Pearl, who teaches Kindergarten. The finale got a little messy! In big bowls of chocolate pudding, gummy bugs were mixed up with four pieces of bubblegum. The contestants raced to find a piece of gum in the pudding, chew it up, blow a bubble, spit it out and repeat the process. Whoever completed the most bubbles in the alloted time would be the winner!
The contest was fast and very messy, and when it was done...it was a tie! With faces covered in chocolate pudding, finalists Ms. Pearl and Mrs. Guptil looked to Mr. Caldwell for a decision. He declared a tie-breaking contest. Whoever could find the final two pieces of gum and spit them onto a plate first would be crowned the victor. Ms. Pearl found her remaining two pieces of gum first and her Kindergarten class exploded with excitement! Their teacher won and they all were going to get to throw pie at their Principal, Mr. Caldwell!
Mrs. Guptil Ms. Pearl
Mr. Caldwell, not wanting to be the only pie target, volunteered retiring school counselor, Mrs. Jarvis, to join him. Ms. Pearl and all her students, armed with pie tins filled with whipped cream, now had their choice of targets. Mr. Caldwell was the one targeted most often, but both ended up pretty messy!
