Families join third-graders for festive afternoon
Brooke McNeal, a senior at Mazama High School, piled up fresh boughs of evergreens next to colorful ribbons, ready to teach third-graders and their parents how to create holiday door decorations.
Across the room, Ash Bartlett, a Mazama junior, organized construction paper, glue, and scissors on a table as she described how students would make a reindeer, snowman, or Christmas tree holiday countdown chain.
Brooke and Ash were among 15 Mazama and Henley high school education pathway students who volunteered to teach arts and crafts Dec. 7 during the Ferguson Elementary School’s first-ever Christmas Crafts and Cocoa event for third-graders and their families.
The event, organized by Ferguson’s three third-grade teachers -- Karyssa Cisneros, Domingo Arriola, and Alyssa Sweeney -- invited families of the third-graders to join their students to make 10 different crafts and enjoy frosted cookies and hot chocolate.
“We wanted to do something to get parents into our school and enjoying activities with their students,” Cisneros said. The Ferguson teachers teamed up with Anna Monteil’s Henley and Mazama education class students, who volunteered to teach and supervise the craft tables.
Albert Mares and Stephanie Carrera joined their third-grader Mercy Grace Mares as she created a snowman ornament. The three sat side by side as Grace painted a snowman face on a wood round. “I love this,” Carrera said of the event. “I also like to see all the (craft) ideas, and I’ll probably do some at home with my day care kids.”
As they finished their crafts, families gravitated to the cookie and cocoa table, where they could ice their own treats. And as one student took a big bite of his iced cookie, his mother exclaimed, “This is so fun!”
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