First Graders Participate in Inaugural "Pioneer Olympics"

For immediate release:
December 19, 20OO
Tampa, FL

What do you get when you combine the study of covered wagons, log cabins, and life as a pioneer with math lessons in measurement during an Olympic year?
If you're a first grader at Independent Day School (IDS), you get the opportunity to participate in the school's inaugural "Pioneer Olympics."

According to the first grade teaching team of Kim Fowler and Debi Brockmeyer who introduced the unusual concept last month to their students, the events that comprised this type of Olympics were variations on traditional Olympic favorites with every measuring activity based on a pioneer theme.

Instead of the discus throw, there was the "Cow Chip Throw" with paper plates substituting for the real thing. During the "Hay Stack Javelin Throw" yellow pipe cleaners were used as hay. Cotton balls were pint-size tumbleweeds for the 'tumbleweed Toss." During a "Teddy Bear Round-Up," students scooped up a fistful of small bears and measured its mass. The "Cow Milking" competition had them measuring how much water they could squeeze out of a sponge. The "Square Dance Side Step" and the "Tall Tale High Jump" involved taking giant steps sideways and up, respectively, and then measuring the results.

Fowler and Brockmeyer first heard of the idea of a Pioneer Olympics at a professional workshop they had attended earlier in the year. They applied the idea to their teaching at IDS as an innovative way to reinforce mathematical skills in standard and nonstandard forms of measurement and integrate social studies lessons about pioneers.

"Integrating lessons helps a child make connections and see that everything goes together in the real world," says Brockmeyer.

'this experience gave meaning as to why we were doing measurement," says Fowler. They got to see that it's just not something in a book, but that we do it all the time. "

After each event, students recorded their results in a journal, and each child received a gold, silver or bronze "Olympic medal" during a special awards ceremony.

The first grade Pioneer Olympics is typical of the type of hands-on curriculum offered by teachers in every grade at IDS. "Hands-on learning helps students understand concepts in a concrete way," says Brockmeyer.

"Before you can move abstractly, you have to have a foundation -- a base knowledge," says Fowler. "And laying that foundation is what first grade is all about."

Founded in 1968, Independent Day School is a fully-accredited, private, non-sectarian school located in the heart of the Carrollwood section of north Tampa. It serves 400 plus students in grades Pre-K through 8. At IDS, all children experience learning in a nurturing, caring, child-centered, and highly academic environment focused on excellence and developing a positive self-concept and high self-esteem.

Contact: Dr. Joyce Burick Swarzman, Head of Independent Day School
Telephone: (813) 961-3087