Amy Rice Sciacca making popcorn for the schools.

Every Thursday, parent Amy Sciacca, comes into school with her young son and makes popcorn for the Westminster Schools’ healthy snack program. (Amy’s mother was once a school board member.) This says quite a bit about the generosity of our parents in this  community. If we look back, the popcorn machine itself was donated by Barbara Sherrod and Mark Steinhardt, when their grandchildren (now in high school) were elementary students here!

Community volunteers have played a large role at the Westminster schools for generations. They continue to quietly leave their mark.

Below, Kathleen Hacker from the Master Gardener Program, helps with measuring during an After School Cooking lesson. She’s modeling much more than measuring here!

measuring yogurt

checking into catalogs

Second graders had a lesson in designing, writing and cooking early this month! Together, they  brainstormed a dream list of what they wanted to include in this year’s garden. Then they got to work  creating garden  designs.  Some of them were very impressive. We used group discussion and seed catalogs to inspire their creations. Students were challenged to write purposefully about their drawings using a ‘hook’ to encourage their audience to read through their pieces. They also had to check in on their use of details and punctuation. All in all, this kept them  dreaming and focused  while small groups went to the kitchen to create pizzas for the class. You could hear the quiet buzz as they worked and shared their garden plans with each other. See examples of their writing below. it’s also on display in the hallway at school. (Click on any image to enlarge.)

Meanwhile, in the kitchen, we remembered last years’ tomatoes, garlic and basil……

Click here for Recipes:  Homemade Pizza Dough Recipe  PIZZA TOPPINGS