Hawk’s Eye

By Karen Sattler
Mill Pond Elementary School
    Welcome to February!! Did you know that students across the country celebrated the 100th day of school this past week? I snuck into Tricia McCarthy’s kindergarten class to see some of the goings-on for myself.
    Students brought in their own collections to represent the number 100.  A few examples:  Matchbox cars, pennies, beads, pom-poms, Lego blocks, and even 100 red hot candies! They took turns sharing about their collections and had the opportunity to play with a great variety of items.
    Mrs. McCarthy read many different books such as “100th Day Worries,” by Margery Cuyler, “Hundred Hungry Ants,” by Elinor J. Pinczes, and “Night Before the 100th Day of School,” by Natasha Wing.
    The children created unique headbands depicting their 100thday and wore them as part of their celebration. Work was done with hundreds math charts as students counted by tens, fives, and twos.  Together, they made a booklet of 100 words they can read. Mrs. McCarthy took pictures of the kids with their collections and each child wrote about their display. Of course, no celebration is complete without cake, supplied by Mrs. McCarthy! Now that we have passed the 100 mark, how many days are left before summer vacation?
    A little background information on Tricia McCarthy. She has been teaching in the SAD 70 school system for 36 years.  Her response to, “Would you do it all over again the same or is there something you would change,” was “I love what I do. I would not change anything!” 
    She is married to her husband, Bob, and still enjoys the company of her 93-year-old mother, three sisters, and one brother. Tricia has a feline friend, a long-haired black cat named Fluffy. She dreams of vacationing in Hawaii.  (I wonder how many of us have that same dream about this time of the year in northern Maine.)
    Mrs. McCarthy has joined the staff of the afterschool program this year.  She does many activities with a variety of students each day.  Students enjoy going to her room and using her Smart Board for academic enrichment and games. Mrs. McCarthy also shares her hobbies of basket making and scrapbooking with interested students. We are glad to be able to add another facet to our program as we look for more ways to engage students in learning and having fun at the same time. 
    As we get closer to high school basketball tournaments, we would like to wish our middle school basketball teams good luck at their upcoming tournaments at Southern Aroostook.  It has been a growing and learning year for both teams and each team has exhibited a desire to learn and have represented our school well.
    Sixth-, seventh-, and eighth-grade students are invited to participate in “Spirit Week” sponsored by student council. We’ll highlight some of those activities next time. If you purchased carnations for Valentine’s Day, council members will be delivering them this week. Remember, it doesn’t have to be Valentine’s Day to tell someone you love them!