Plains JH students share stories

It was students teaching students last week at Plains School where a group of seventh graders read stories to elementary students and showed the younger kids their writing styles.

Sixteen students from Kati Mitchell’s Keyboarding and Computer Applications class took classic children’s stories and tweaked them by changing characters and plots and inserting their own creative writing styles and they designed their own graphics for the stories. The team of Miranda Dawson and Reese Meredith altered the story “Frozen” and made their own version called “Melted,” and the well known fable “Little Red Riding Hood” was transformed to the “Little Red Wolf” by Kiara Brown and Kameryn Malmend.

Kati Mitchell’s seventh graders teamed in pairs and for almost an hour each day for three days last week they read their works to kindergartners, second graders and third graders. Eighty-three-year-old Bill Beck of Plains, who reads to elementary school students weekly, sat in to listen to the readers on Tuesday. The seventh graders put their story rendition, along with their graphics, on a tablet so the kids could follow along in the story. The students broke into small groups and rotated from station to station to hear the new adventures and see the computerized illustrations. Each pair spent a few minutes with each group and gave them a quick quiz on the story after their presentation.

Third-grade teacher Rhonda Leeper said her students had nothing but positive remarks about the presentations. “I liked the ghost one because it liked meeting new people,” said third-grader Braidy Rivinius. “I really liked the donkey one because it was the donkey from Shrek,” said classmate Neviah Black.

Leeper, who’s in her first year of full-time teaching, said she liked this activity because it gave her students something to look forward to when they reach the seventh grade. “Some of the benefits of reading can be acquiring new vocabulary and information as well as sharing your interests with others. Audio books are a valuable tool for individuals who are challenged with reading text and can provide the same benefits,” said Leeper.

Mitchell started this program seven years ago and said it’s been rewarding for her students and the recipients. “Having them reading and sharing something that they created is great for their development and confidence in their work. It also gets them out of being selfish or in their own little world and start thinking about other people within the school,” said Mitchell.

“This would definitely fit under using their knowledge of Google Slides and being ready for their future classes and career skills after high school,” said Mitchell. The Keyboarding and Computer Applications class teaches them a wide variety of skills, such as becoming proficient in keyboarding, knowledgeable about using Google applications, and becoming familiar with the coding language in technology. “These are all skills that students need to have in order to be successful in the future in any career they choose,” said Mitchell, who has recently become certified in educational leadership, such as becoming a school principal.

Her students have been working on their stories for about three weeks. Meredith and Dawson said the plot in “Melted” was about the same, but they changed the names of the characters. Brown and Malmend still had a wolf in their “Little Red Wolf,” but instead of the wolf wanting to eat grandma, a hunter was after the wolf and it was up to the grandpa's character to save it.

Mitchell said the project not only prepares her students with technology skills to portray ideas and creativity, but it also reaffirms reading skills. She said the students selected which stories to revamp and she felt that all of the presentations were excellent. “There have been some that are done very well and exceed expectations. This year they did another great job and put twists on stories that I would have never thought of,” said Mitchell, who makes sure the stories are age appropriate.

“The little kids love our kids coming down and sharing their stories. It gets them out of the routine and to see what they could be doing in their future years, something to look forward to,” said Mitchell.