Slowly a smile spread across the face of Tegan Korzeniewski, 6, as the cover of Eric Carle’s book, “10 Little Ducks,” emerged from the wrapping paper.
Kneeling by his side, Mikayla Durham, 13, helped him peel back the bright blue paper.
“Do you like it?” the Oak Hill Middle School student asked.
Tegan’s little head bobbed up and down furiously.
“Oh yes!” he responded.
The next present revealed the same art as Carle’s children book, only this was a hand-crafted quilt made by Durham herself.
Christmas had arrived a week and a half early to the Community Resource Room at Libby-Tozier School in Litchfield.
After Oak Hill Middle School eighth-grade English language arts teacher Patricia Hasch received a generous donation of Eric Carle fabric from her cousin, Clifford Quibell, who works for Andover Fabrics in New York, Hasch showed the expensive swatches to Title 1 literacy specialist Deanna Wall, and the duo hatched a plan.
During the first ever enrichment sewing class offered at OHMS, Hasch asked the 15 girls and one boy if they would like to sew a quilt for the six community resource students at the nearby elementary school.
“Everyone was on board,” Hasch said after the quilt exchange on Dec. 14.
Since the fabrics were designs from a popular children’s author and illustrator, Wall thought it would be perfect to tie literacy into the project.
Along with each quilt given to the students and their siblings, a Carle book of the same theme was given as well.
“OHMS fosters teaching and learning like no other,” Wall said. “The quilt and literacy project is a perfect example of the leadership that resonates in each classroom at OHMS.”
Not only were the students learning giving without receiving, but they were learning a life skill and how to collaborate with each other.
“We also made rag blankets for the Linus Project. When students needed help getting them finished, they would get their friends to help tie them in study hall,” said Hasch. “It’s wonderful to watch them work together.”
All of the OHMS students felt they were given a gift on the exchange day as well.
“It was very rewarding,” said Sierra Hill, 15, who also sewed quilts in class. “It felt really good. I felt like I had accomplished a lot.”
“Seeing the smiles on the kids’ faces was great,” added Zoe Hill, 13, Sierra’s cousin. “The best was learning how to sew. I thought it wasn’t going to be fun, but I really enjoyed it.”
Since the class, Hasch and Wall have heard from numerous students they now have a new Christmas wish.
“Many of them said they have asked for sewing machines for Christmas,” said Wall.
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- Heather Pelletier, right, an ed tech at Libby-Tozier School in Litchfield, gets Keira Smith to pause from reading Eric Carle’s “The Grouchy Ladybug” so she can wrap her up in her new quilt at the school on Dec. 14. Smith, along with Adam Mosher, left, and Jordan Landers all 6, received handmade Eric Carle-themed quilts and books from Oak Hill Middle students.
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- Adam Mosher, right, waits patiently while Mikayla Durham, 13, left, helps Tegan Korzeniewski unwrap his Eric Carle book and quilt during a a cookie social at the Libby-Tozier School in Litchfield on Dec. 14. Durham made the quilt, plus another, to give to Korzeniewski and his sibling in an enrichment sewing class at Oak Hill Middle School.
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