CES students and staff decorate doors
If you had to judge 28 holiday decorated classroom doors at Coshocton Elementary School would you be able to pick just one winner for each category? The categories that they are competing for are originality, neatness, student involvement, overall individual door and overall team design, The winners of each category will be awarded a plaque to display in their classroom.
Tony Meiser, elementary principal, was thrilled that this was the sixth annual holiday door decorating contest to be held at CES. This year he has integrated the Leader in Me program into the making of the themes. Meiser is inspired to see how the students apply their leadership skills throughout the competition. The judging took place on Dec. 17.
The panel of judges for this year’s competition consisted of three school counselors Darcy Nelson, Megan Haywood and Megan Hemming, Cora Cramblett, Ethan Weinberg both seventh graders at Coshocton, and Cami Loomis and Shiann Stubbs both ninth graders at Coshocton High School. The counselors started a peer mentors group this year and the student judges are all mentors from this program. These students along with others come over to the elementary and work with students that might need a little extra help learning sight words or math or reading.
The judging started at the preschool doors. There they were greeted with music, jingle bells, and treats. The preschool classes worked together with the theme “Here comes Santa Right Down Gingerbread Lane!” Each preschooler, had made a cut-out of a gingerbread man decorated it and added their face on them to line the hallway.
The kindergartner classes decided to decorate their doors individually. They had such cute and creative themes. The doors for the first grade classrooms were decorated as one theme. They had Christmas trees made using the children’s hand prints on each door. Starting with the first door they had one snowman holding a star reaching up toward the top of the tree and on the next door, there were two snowmen. A second snowman was holding up the first snowman while he was still reaching for the top of the tree with the star. And each door that followed one more snowman was added to the team, to help the first snowman reach the top of the tree so the star can be put on it. This took a total of six snowmen to reach the top. “Work together to build others up.” Teamwork is a great skill to be a great leader.
Second grade, sixth grade and fifth grade chose to do individual themes for their doors. Among these themes were “You can’t catch me, I’m the Gingerbread Man,” “Coshocton Snow Place like Home,” “We are all like Snowflakes Unique and One of a Kind,” “Light up the Season,” “Believe in your Elf,” “We’re Nutty for Learning,” “Let us out for Christmas Break,” “This Class is only Silent at Night,” “Westward Ho Ho Ho,” and “Merry Christmas, and Believe!”
All these doors were unique and wonderful in their own way, but there were three that stood to the judges, one being Mrs. Olinger’s class door “Coshocton Snow Place Like Home!” Along with cute little snowmen on the door the judges were impressed that the students wrote where their favorite places were in Coshocton and why.
Mrs. Snider incorporated part of their social studies curriculum into their door, “Westward ho ho ho.” They are learning about the westward expansion in America. Because of this door, Meiser is going to add a new category to the competition next year, educational.
The last door was Mrs. Kulczycki’s door with “Believe!” Five students stood outside the door and handed out candy canes while Christmas music was playing in the background. This was an opportunity for the students to showcase their “Leader in me” skills.
The Charlie Brown Christmas story was the theme for the third grade doors. They started off with Lucy and Charlie Brown at Lucy‘s Psych Help stand, followed by Snoopy commercializing Christmas. The kids sliding down the hill on their sleds, Snoopy flying his doghouse with Woodstock next Linus telling Charlie Brown the true meaning of Christmas. Finally Charlie Brown and Snoopy were so happy they were dancing.
Then the judges were off to The Island of Misfits Toys, courtesy of the fourth grade doors. “Why fit in when you were born to Standout” The kids had colored Charlie-in-the-boxes, a doll with red hair, spotted elephants, an airplane that can’t fly and some other characters from the island. They also decorated the hallway with a giant blowup Rudolph and they had the cartoon playing on a TV in the background.
The results for the 2024 holiday door decorating competition for originality – fourth grade team with “The Island of Misfit Toys.” For the category of neatness was Mrs. Swigert‘s kindergarten class “Reindeer.” For the best student involvement was preschool with “Here comes Santa Right Down Gingerbread Lane.” For overall individual the winner was Mrs. Olinger’s second grade class with “Coshocton Snow Place Like Home.” And the last category overall team design went to the first graders for their design of “Work Together to Build Others Up.”
Meiser said, “The most rewarding aspect of this competition is how it brings our entire school community—staff, students, and faculty—together. It is truly one of the highlights of the year and one of my favorite activities.”
Category: Education
