Wayne County Life

Lincoln School first grader Shelby Schermerhorn made a robot snow princess during Global School Play Day 2017. (Photo credit: Jill Hausman)

Lincoln School pupils joined thousands of children around the globe February 1st, 2017 as they participated in the third annual “Global School Play Day" (GSPD).

Just as she did last year after learning on social media about the annual event meant to highlight the value of unstructured play time for school children, Kindergarten teacher Martha Groot suggested Lincoln School teachers participate again this year.

"The goal of the 'play day' is to recognize and honor the importance of play in a child's life . . . ” Groot said.

So, on the third anniversary of the GSPD event, Lincoln School children took turns going into different classrooms, playing with different toys and taking part in new activities.

From 9:30 to 11 a.m., the Pre-K and Kindergarten hall and classrooms at Lincoln were alive with fun as pupils played in different spaces with toys brought in from home to share with others, dolls, play-doh, cardboard boxes, puppets, board games and more. And there was an area set up for students to make arts and crafts.

In the afternoon, first and second graders took turns going into different classrooms for an hour to participate in similar activities.

Kindergarten pupil Jenny Corbett with doll

What’s more, some of the fun centered on creating things, like in Kathy Chambers' first grade classroom and Catherine Riley-Nicosia’s second grade classroom, using ordinary, everyday materials like cardboard boxes and tubes and masking tape.

Lincoln School Principal Stephanie Miller was happy the school’s participation in Global Day of Play also involved creating spaces in which children, who wanted to, were encouraged “to create, tinker and explore imaginative uses of common household items.”

Second grader Nathan George in cardboard box

Before Feb.1st, during library time, students were read such books as “The Nowhere Box” by Sam Zuppardi and “Not A Box” by Antoinette Portis to teach them more about using their imagination to create things with ordinary materials. That helped them decide if they wanted to participate in the creative activities during the GSPD event.

Chambers said students really enjoyed the creative process Feb. 1st. “The kids loved it and they had a ball trying out different ideas and having the freedom to create,’’ she said, noting they made a woodpecker, a camera and a robot.

First grader Shelby Schermerhorn made a robot snow princess because snow and Christmas are her favorite things. "We got to go into different classrooms and use different things,’’Schermerhorn said of the GSPD event. “It was great."

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