Sacred Heart students enjoy family night
Sacred Heart Elementary School held its third annual pumpkins and pizza party on Oct. 10. The young people had some creative ideas for their pumpkins, some were silly and some looked a little scary.
Principal Mary Kobel said, “We are having our family pumpkin and pizza night with pumpkins donated by Brian Darr and pizza donated by Amici’s in West Lafayette. We do this because we know it is important for families to be together and have fun. Family wellness directly impacts student wellness which directly impacts school wellness and a big focus of ours beyond academics is family wellness. We like to provide opportunities for family’s to get together with no stress, to have fun and celebrate the different seasons. We found that a lot of our kids have not carved pumpkins. We wanted to give them an opportunity to carve pumpkins, have a good contest with each other and have a good time in a relaxed environment.”
Students and their families could carve or paint their pumpkin and enjoy pizza along with cup cakes and cookies to decorate provided by Buehler’s. Dan Duren donated caramel apples to take home.
“A lot of community effort goes into having this family night,” Kobel said. “It’s so nice for us as teachers and staff to see them in a different light having fun and it is nice for them to see us having fun. The relationships that we build are imperative. Teachers need to do more than just teach. The kids want to learn from us when they know that we love them and they love us and we have that relationship. In many ways these night events that we have are the most important things that we offer. This is our third year of having everyone. We have other family nights, some family dances and spring activities, a carnival and we have play activities. When we have snow we go sled riding in the snow, in the summer we do slip and slide because play is imperative to their learning. Also, it is important for them to be away from video games and use their mind to create something and be outside to get some fresh air play. It is neat because we have moms and dads, grandparents and everybody participates. It is exciting to see more people involved in their education.”
Roman Jacobs was all smiles helping his parents Lacey and Raymond clean out a pumpkin. “We tried it at home last year and Roman was super disgusted. He wasn’t interested. This is the first year he has really had his hands in it. He’s having a good time now,” mom said.
Ashley Rogers and Kayla Freeman were helping their youngsters create the face for their pumpkins and getting them ready to carve. ‘They all go to Sacred Heart,” Rogers said. “We did this last year and they were so excited to come. That is all William has talked about all week, coming here. He loves doing this, he loves going to school here and he loves how they have family nights like this. It is really nice.”
Tiffany Cano and children painted their pumpkins, equally messy but no carving involved. Seven year old Wyatt is in second grade at Sacred Heart and three year old Eliana is in preschool.
“This is our first time to be here and they are really excited. We are really enjoying it as a family,” mom said.
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