Hello, Mr. President! Fort Cherry fifth-graders learn about U.S. history – and engineering
Shown with their presidents are Fort Cherry Elementary Center fifth-graders, from left, Ava Menzies, Menzi Sherwin, Rocco Pascasio, Louis Ryan and Kaylee Weinbrenner.
Louis Ryan dressed President Teddy Roosevelt in camouflage after learning that Roosevelt enjoyed hunting and shooting.
Ava Menzies was told that her interpretation of President James A. Garfield resembles Zero Mostel, who portrayed Tevye in “Fiddler on the Roof.”
Rocco Pascasio went the extra distance with his model of President Barack Obama, creating a podium for the 44th president of the United States.
Menzi Sherwin said she made some of President George W. Bush’s clothing out of bed sheets.
Kaylee Weinbrenner made sure President Thomas Jefferson was holding a copy of the Declaration of Independence, which the third president of the United States authored.
McDONALD – Ava Menzies was told that her model of President James A. Garfield resembles Zero Mostel, who played Tevye in “Fiddler on the Roof.”
That may be, but at least the fifth-grader at Fort Cherry Elementary Center had fun creating the likeness of the 20th president of the United States while, at the same time, learning some interesting historical facts – and a little about engineering.
Ava and other fifth-graders in Kylie Zibert’s class were given a research and writing assignment on a U.S. president of their choice. As an extension of the assignment, they were asked to create a model of the president they selected. The only stipulation was they had to use a two-liter bottle of pop as the body.
“They could use any kind of medium after that,” said Zibert, who teaches social studies/science. “Art and engineering were part of the assignment, too. We also talked about proportion.”
The students were very creative, with some, like Menzi Sherwin, using paper mâché for the head, or clay, like Rocco Pascasio did for his model of Barack Obama. Louis Ryan used Styrofoam for Teddy Roosevelt’s head.
Ava said she tried a foam form for Garfield’s head, “but it either looked like the sun or it looked like Donald Trump.”
And Trump was not part of this assignment, since he’s only been in office for less than a month. Neither was George Washington nor Abraham Lincoln, since all of the students are quite familiar with them.
During the course of a month, Zibert heard all the troubles the students were having trying to create their models, from cracked clay to difficulty balancing the heads. “Some added arms to balance them out,” she said.
The students’ creativity extended well beyond the presidents’ heads, though, with the hair made of a variety of mediums, including cotton, yarn, material and pipe cleaners.
Rocco even made a podium for Obama, and Kaylee Weinbrenner had President Thomas Jefferson holding a copy of the Declaration of Independence.
“Whenever Thomas Jefferson was 10 or 12, he wrote the first draft of the Declaration of Independence,” said Kaylee, who learned that through her research.
Zibert said students had to write a report and a poem. The report had to include four to six facts from each of the three stages of the presidents’ lives – childhood, adulthood and their presidency – plus two fun facts. Their research was done in school; the art component was completed at home.
Kaylee said that she and her mother both burned themselves while applying Jefferson’s buttons to his suit with a glue gun, and when Kaylee tried to shape his nose, it fell apart. She also encountered another problem. “I’m not good at cutting that well,” said. “One foot was on top of the other, so it was a little wobbly.”
One of the students even tried to attach shoes from Playskool’s Mr. Potato Head to his president’s body, but they fell off.
Ava said she enjoyed working on Garfield with her grandmother, who likes to sew. But like the others, she ran into some difficulties.
“One of the great challenges for me was making it balance. The head was so heavy,” she said.
The presidents are quite fashionable, too, with their clothing representing the period in which they served. Menzi made some of George W. Bush’s attire from bed sheets, and said she thought it was cool that she got to research a president who served after she was born.
Louis dressed Roosevelt in camouflage, a reflection of the president’s passion for hunting and shooting. He also enjoyed researching Roosvelt, as he mentioned several interesting tidbits that he learned.
“Roosevelt was shot in the chest,” Louis said, referring to the incident that occurred on Oct. 14, 1912, outside a Milwaukee, Wis., hotel. Fragments of the bullet lodged in Roosevelt’s chest after hitting his steel eyeglass case. Rather than being rushed to the hospital, Roosevelt delivered a scheduled 90-minute speech.
“People tried to kill him six or seven times,” Louis said. “Once they cut the rope off a boat so it would drift on the river.”
He also was the first president to win a Nobel Peace prize, Louis noted, and his wife died on Valentine’s Day (1884), a few hours after his mother passed away.
Rocco, who, like his classmates, ran into trouble trying to scuplt Obama’s head from oven-baked clay, said his favorite part of the project was “drinking all the Mountain Dew to empty the bottle.”
But on a more serious note, Rocco said he learned that when Obama “was a kid in school, he wrote a poem that he wanted to be president.” And he did, serving two terms as the 44th president of the United States.
This is the third year for the project at the school, with Zibert conducting it for two of those years.
“It was exciting they got to see last year’s models, and next year, students will get to see these,” Zibert said. “I think they did a wonderful job.”