Fifth-graders dressed up for special day and learned how to make
butter
Gilroy – Girls roamed the campus decked out in long, solid-colored skirts, aprons and mop caps. Boys strutted the pavement wearing black tricorn hats and white, long-sleeved button-up shirts.
Even teachers Gloria Hennessy and Karen Hansen cast away their normal attire, replacing it with ruffled skirts, caps and shawls Thursday for the school’s annual Colonial Day. The time period is part of the fifth-grade curriculum so only the fifth grade classes – plus some fourth-graders in a fourth/fifth combination class – get to participate.
Although students are pumped when the historical, yet enlightening event materializes, Hennessy was delightfully surprised to see so many dressed up in colonial garb when the children poured into the classroom in the morning.
“It’s really neat to see the kids get into it,” she said.
But the day isn’t simply a tribute to the simple dress of the early days of America. From the time school began until it let out, students were immersed in the time period when our country was comprised of only 13 colonies.
The fifth and fourth graders were instructed to address the female teachers by Mistress rather than Mrs. and Keith Braughton, the other fifth grade teacher, answered to Master Braughton.
In one classroom, Jesseca King, 11, and J.T. Hellman, 10, shook up large jars of cream for butter – another activity of the day. The two girls said they enjoyed catching up on the colonial times by making butter, dressing up and most importantly, partaking in a mid-day feast complete with pumpkin pie, turkey and cornbread.
When asked if she’s glad she didn’t grow up during a time when butter-making was such a production, Jesseca had a fast answer.
“I would hate not going to school,” the fifth-grader said.
After recess, Braughton passed out brightly colored feathers and small ink wells, which the students were told would serve as their writing tools. He asked the kids to tell him what wasn’t around during the colonial days.
Students raised their hands and gave examples: cell phones, running water, video games, sewing machines. One student added in air conditioning. That’s right, Braughton said.
“When it got hot they just suffered with the heat,” he said.
