Lindbergh School District Students Participate in Winter, Holiday Activities

The holidays are in full swing, as students from the Lindbergh School District participated in several activities this week. 

first-graders learned holiday traditions from several of the world’s continents in December, building their acceptance and understanding of other cultures.

Students learned that the custom of having a Christmas tree in the home comes from Germany. They decorated their own trees and learned to sing “O Tannenbaum.” They also made a kinara candle holder while learning the seven principles of Kwanzaa, and worked together to make wooden shoes as they studied the tradition of St. Nikolaus’ Day, which is celebrated in Holland and Germany on Dec. 5.

Students also learned about Hanukkah symbols such as a menorah and Dreidel, and celebrated Sweden’s St. Lucia Day Dec. 13, which reminds people that days with more light will be coming soon. Finally, students made holiday ornaments from Italy and Polish ornament chains to decorate Christmas trees, as they learned about the Italian tradition of Old Befana and Poland’s unique Christmas Eve traditions.

K-Kids is an international student-led program for elementary schools that helps students serve, build character and develop leadership skills. Lindbergh’s groups are chartered in partnership with the Kiwanis Club of Crestwood-Sunset Hills.  and  Elementary School K-Kids gathered again this year at area grocery stores to ring Salvation Army bells and collect money for those in need in the familiar red kettles. During their time of service, students sang carols and shared holiday greetings with shoppers.

Kennerly kids at the Dierberg’s on Tesson Ferry raised $259 in donations. Long School students rang bells at on Watson Road.

Want to donate to the Sunset Hills-Crestwood Salvation Army online Red Kettle Campaign? Click . 

Also at Kennerly, second-grade teacher Karen Kempen used familiar gingerbread house makings—gumdrops, graham crackers and licorice strips,—to teach students about different landforms. Students made three-dimensional landform islands to review and reinforce their social studies knowledge of islands, mountains, valleys, hills, plains, rivers and lakes.

The islands were made with rice krispie treats, and then students used icing and blue sprinkles to make oceans and lakes, green sprinkles for plains, green gumdrops for hills, Hershey Kisses for mountains, red gumdrops for volcanoes and blue icing for rivers. Swedish Fish also could be seen swimming in the oceans of sprinkles.