McGlynn Elementary School Projects
Animal Shelter Donation Flyer
Animal shelters are always in need of extra supplies, and these students wanted to get involved! People who work at animal shelters not only need to keep the facility clean and organized, but need to ensure the animals are taken care of, loved, and prepared for adoption. These students created a flyer to let the McGlynn community know how they can contribute to their cause. The flyer listed multiple animal shelters who need our help within the Medford area. Students suggested donations of blankets, dog food, old pet beds, toys, etc. to help support the success of, not only the animal shelters, but the success of animals being adopted by a loving owner!
Animal Ads
These second grade girls tackled a two-fold project. They first decorated posters and a collection bin to collect donated items for the North East Animal Shelter. They let members of our McGlynn School community know that the donations could be brought to the school and that they would reach the non profit animal shelter. Needed supplies such as old towels or blankets, old newspaper and pet food has been rolling in! Secondly, the girls researched available pets at the shelter. They then wrote an ad, describing a pet and giving pertinent information about that pet. “This kitty loves to run and cuddle!” “Smokey the dog is lonely and wants a home!” The ads were combined into a booklet and distributed to all members of the McGlynn Elementary School. Hopefully, all of this free advertising will help an animal at a shelter find a loving home!
A Song of Respect
These two musically-inclined 2nd-graders decided they wanted to put their talents to use in order to do something in line with the school’s Respect Month, part of the C.A.R.E.S. values system. So, they re-wrote the lyrics of Anna Kendrick’s popular “Cups” song to be about respect and kindness. They designed a Google Slides presentation of their new lyrics for fellow students to sing along with, and they also wrote a short skit and choreographed a music video for the song!
Classroom Bookmarks
These 2nd-graders love to read, and love arts and crafts! So, they decided to use their arts and crafts skills to enhance the reading experience for their classmates. After noticing that many students didn’t have bookmarks to keep their place when reading, these 2nd-graders decided to make some! They decorated colored cardstock with stickers, ribbons, markers, and glitter glue. They also made containers for their bookmarks using old cans. They made enough to place a can of bookmarks in all four 2nd grade classrooms, and also all five 5th grade classrooms!
Cootie Catcher Conservation
These second grade boys are concerned with our environment and especially concerned with increasing the understanding of how to protect endangered animals. They wanted to inform their peers about different animals that were endangered in a different and fun way. So… they came up with making fortune tellers/cootie catchers that kids could play with at lunch. During the course of the fall session, they identified 3 different animals(tigers, sharks and sea turtles), found facts about those animals, chose pictures of those animals and put all onto a template for a cootie catcher. Next, came the folding. They folded about 50 different cootie catchers for each animal. The folding and opening game was placed strategically on all the elementary school lunch tables so that students could read the facts and see the pictures when they were done with lunch.
Crayon Recycling
This team of artistic 2nd-graders got the idea for this project from an activity that Kahlan had done at a birthday party. He explained that instead of throwing away old crayons, they can be turned into new crayons in different shapes, by melting them down in silicon molds! First, the group designed a flyer asking teachers at the school to donate their old crayons to the project. They received hundreds! The next step was to peel the wrappers off of the donated crayons. Not having an oven at their disposal, they instead used borrowed toaster ovens to melt the old crayons down into new shapes. They used molds in a variety of shapes, yielding new crayons shaped like Legos, robots, puzzle pieces, and more! They gifted the new and improved crayons back to the teachers and parents who had originally donated old crayons to them. Their project helped reduce waste by repurposing crayons that would have otherwise been thrown away, and also created something beautiful!
Homemade Cat and Dog Toys
These resourceful 3rd-5th grade students wanted to do something to help animals in shelters, and together we came up with the idea to make some homemade pet toys to donate! We contacted the Volunteer Coordinator at Northeast Animal Shelter in Salem, who we’ve worked with in past years, for ideas. She sent us several sets of instructions for homemade pet toys using objects you can find around the house. The students brought the materials in, and spent the next several weeks making cat and dog toys from materials like tennis balls, socks, plastic bottles, and fabric strips.
Magical McGlynn Meeting Tree
In the middle of the elementary school playground, between both sides of the playground, sits a tree. This tree is a favorite meeting place for students of both grades using the playground. Unfortunately, this tree is in need of soil and mulch to cover its many roots. These boys thought about incorporating a kindness activity with a beautification project. They thought up an idea to have all the students of the school paint kindness words/sayings on rocks with buddy classes. Later on, these rocks would be put outside, along with some soil and mulch to decorate the meeting tree. Kindness Rocks!