Friendships that Grow on Trees

Prekindergarten students joined forces with their 3rd-grade friends on a special project to create cement pavers to identify trees on campus. “The students partnered up in the fall to pick their tree on campus, and the 3rd-graders used an app on their iPads to figure out what type of tree it was,” said Prekindergarten Teacher and Outdoor Education Committee co-chair Jennifer Keppler. They then drew pictures of the leaf and used a carving machine from the Wildcat Creation Station in the Lower School to design and produce labels, which included their leaf drawings and the species of the tree.

The students then pressed the finished labels into wet cement to form the pavers, with the help of Tom Mussoline, Lower School and Middle School academic technology coordinator. In spring, they partnered up one last time to “plant” their pavers at the base of the trees. “This was a really great project and the students had so much fun working together,” said 3rd Grade Teacher Bonnie Seidel.